Shadow of the Devil
by dripley11
Summary: A normal life - that's what most say they want. Naruto got that wish when he began attending Kuoh academy four months ago. Then one day he dies, just as he lived, protecting his new friend - Issei - from a man claiming that his friend was now something called a Stray Devil and spouting off some nonsense about being a Fallen Angel. Being a jinchuuriki, he should've seen this coming.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

* * *

Naruto pulled out his orange bento box and sat down underneath one of his favorite trees on the Kuoh Academy grounds. He then unveiled his pair of chopsticks and began to dig into the lunch he'd made that same morning.

The spring breeze blew over the young blonde teen gently while the bright green tree leaves above him rustled in the wind as he thought, _It really is peaceful here. Nowhere near as hectic as it was back in Konoha._

_**Indeed it is, Naruto,**_Kurama responded to his thoughts. _**It's also exceptionally – **_

"Boring!" the teenaged young man finished for him. "And I'd have to agree you on that, Kurama."

"Yo!" a voice the whiskered teen recognized called to him. The blonde turned his head towards the person and watched as a spiky-haired boy with his hair a dark brown ran over towards the sitting Naruto. "Naruto!"

"What is it, Issei?" he asked while Issei made his way over to the tree everyone at Kuoh knew was Naruto's and Naruto's alone. The few who'd challenged the former shinobi for that spot found out very quickly that – even without the ability to use Chakra anymore – the whiskered blonde was _very_ territorial. _Just want to reiterate that I still blame you for that, you damn fox._

_**Oh, shut up and pay attention to your friend,**_ Kurama responded with annoyance.

The amber-eyed sixteen-year-old clambered into the shade and let out a few gasps for air as he took a seat right next to Naruto.

"Go right ahead," the blonde began while offering a bite of an egg roll to Issei. "You didn't have anything for breakfast, I take it?"

Issei shook his head as he took the egg roll, tossed it in his mouth, and devoured it greedily. He then answered the blonde, "No. Mom and Dad have been on vacation the past few days. They should make it back tonight, though."

"I see," Naruto responded carefully as he bit down on another bite of food.

_**Naruto,**_his inner fox piped in from inside his head. _**Can you feel that?**_

_I can,_ he told the biju.

"Oh, I almost forgot!" the brown-haired boy exclaimed. He then turned and looked directly at Naruto as he asked, "Do _you_ remember Yuuma-chan?"

The blue-eyed young man blew out a frustrated breath before reminding the other boy, "I was out sick the past few days, remember?" _I should've followed that girl better,_ he told himself darkly while preventing his facial features from showing any indication of his internal strife.

_**You'd have been slaughtered and you know it,**_ Kurama reiterated for him. _**Face it: Without Chakra, all you can really do is sense presences. Had you gone after someone on even her level of power as you are now you'd be dead.**_

Naruto's face twitched at the blunt statement from his inner partner. He was well-aware of that fact, but having it pointed out in such a manner wasn't called for in his mind.

"Oh," Issei blinked dumbly at Naruto's answer to his query. "I guess I forgot that I never introduced you to her. But do you think I'm a liar like Matsuda and Motohama?"

Naruto openly snorted at the question as he told the boy, "Issei, you're many things: Weak as a newborn, just as hard-headed as I am, and quite possibly the biggest pervert I've ever had the pleasure of meeting – and believe me when I say that actually means something positive. But a _liar_? No way. You couldn't lie to save your life. Back where I'm from, a six-year-old could lie better than you. So if you say you had a girlfriend while I was out sick, even though I'll be skeptical, I do believe you, Issei."

"You're the only person I asked who believes me!" the naïve boy cried as he then wrapped Naruto in a hug that left the blonde feeling slightly uncomfortable since he could now feel his shoulder getting a little damp. "You're a wonderful friend, Naruto," Issei insisted after peeling himself off of the blonde.

"I'm just someone who knows a liar when he sees one, Issei," the whiskered boy repeated, "and you're not a liar. Now, can I eat the rest of my lunch in peace? I'd also like to finish that homework First Period gave us since I have the time…"

Issei Hyoudou stood up and let out a few chuckles as he told Naruto, "You're way too serious about that stuff, Naruto. You ought to be focusing on getting your hands on some girls before we graduate like me! I mean, can Physics offer you the splendid view and feeling that a wonderful pair of oppai can?"

"Well, I say you should focus on losing your virginity before claiming I prefer class over breasts," Naruto fired back teasingly at the teen, making Issei freeze and stare at him in shock.

"You-You mean…" Issei stammered in reply.

"Yep," the whiskered teen chuckled as the perverted boy's jaw went slack. "It was back before I came to Tokyo, and no, I won't give you any details," he told Issei sternly as the gold-eyed teen made to ask. "All I'll say is this: Fit women have _amazing_ bodies, Issei."

The perverted boy then turned and sprinted away from the cackling blonde at full speed. As Issei made his way further away in his dust cloud Naruto heard, "Even _Naruto_ has seen a real pair before me! The world is just too cruel!"

"What did you just say!?" the voice of Matsuda echoed over the grounds.

"Did you just say what I think you said!?" Motohama added on.

"_Naruto_ lost his virginity before us!?" both other members of the Perverted Trio screamed in disbelief so loud it left an echo over the entire Academy.

Meanwhile, Naruto was currently rolling on the ground and shaking in semi-silent laughter at the reactions that particular bombshell had gotten out of the Perverse Sannin. "I wonder how bad the rumor mill's gonna make that bit of news?" he thought aloud after ceasing his chuckles and managing to prop his back up against the trunk of the tree.

_**I was never one to care for gossip, **_Kurama chimed in,_** that was more Matatabi,**_ _**but what these humans in this world come up with never leaves me un-entertained.**_

"I'll give you that," the whiskered blonde replied verbally. He then looked to his left and noticed a group of girls standing about thirty yards away from him and realized just who was always followed around by that many females at once. "Hey there, Kiba," he greeted his fellow blonde politely as the group of fangirls followed the heartthrob around campus.

"Hello there, Uzumaki-san," Kiba Yuuto returned with a polite nod, smile, and wave of his hand. "How are you today?"

"Can't really complain," he shrugged back in answer. _I was right,_ he then thought. _Issei's aura now feels like how Kiba, Koneko-chan, and the entire Student Council's feel. Just what happened yesterday?_ he silently wondered.

_**I can't tell you,**_ the gigantic fox in his belly repeated. _**While the powers from all those people and now Issei feel quite dark, it's not necessarily evil.**_

"That's good to know," Yuuto answered the other blonde. "Well, I must be going, Uzumaki-san. Class is about to begin again."

"Eh," the whiskered, spiky-headed teen replied with a shrug. "I may not even bother going back today. Exams are still a few months away, after all. No need to rush."

The pretty-boy with the fangirls shook his head in bemusement before saying, "No wonder people seem to think you're a delinquent, Uzumaki-san. Skipping class?"

"My teachers can't really complain though," he fired back. "Last I checked I was fourth in the year."

"Third now, apparently," Kiba informed him, making the former shinobi raise an inquisitive eyebrow at how he'd gotten that bit of information since not even his teachers knew that yet. The only ones who had access to that information were the Student Council and the Top Staff of the school – and him, since no lock could hold him out.

"Well that's _fantastic_," he drawled out sarcastically as he stood up and dusted off his pants. Naruto collected his bento before sticking his hands behind his head, turning, and beginning to walk away from Kiba and his little following. "I guess I'll see 'ya around," he finished with a dismissive wave of his hand before continuing on until he simply walked out the Kuoh front gate.

The former shinobi whistled a jaunty tune to himself as he made his way across town and to the apartment he was currently calling home. He made certain to always keep his eyes looking out for any of those pesky 'Police Officers,' as they were called, because the first time he'd skipped class they'd dragged him back to it, as it was apparently _against the law_ for someone his age not being in school during school hours.

Assholes.

Naruto walked into the practically-empty building and made his way straight to the elevator. Once the slinging doors had opened he entered, pressed the button for the top floor, and rode the machine up to the floor his room was on.

As soon as the doors opened up once the elevator reached the ninth floor, Naruto exited the elevator. He then began to make his way through the basically-deserted, but eerily clean, hallway until he reached the apartment his scholarship gave him: Room Nine-Seventeen.

After pulling out his keys and unlocking the only occupied room in the entire complex, Naruto entered his domain. Immediately upon stepping through the doorway, he jumped back into the hall to avoid the falling bucket of water he'd left as a trap and caught it before the contents could spill out and make a mess. "Still got it," he grinned to himself as he set the aluminum pail just inside the door and next to his umbrella stand.

The young teen's blue eyes darted around the room at speeds that would've made a hawk jealous in an effort to determine if there had been any intruders in his time away – ever since his apartment had been broken into three months ago, he always left things in a random order when he went to school every morning in order to prevent a pattern from being noticed. Noticing nothing out of place, he heaved a sigh before closing the door behind him, knowing there was no need to lock the door in a seemingly-abandoned building while he was there.

The highschool shinobi then walked across his large living room and threw his backpack on the blue sofa as he made his way into the standard-sized kitchen. His eyes scanned over to the lone window and stopped as he stared at it in shock. "Well they fixed that quick," he noted aloud.

_**Isn't that the window you broke this morning to test this building's owner's response time?**_ Kurama queried.

"Yep," he answered the fox. "I shattered that thing pretty good too."

_**So that means our hunch was correct.**_

"It does," he nodded in agreement. "It looks like I'm not just paranoid, Kurama. This apartment is being watched."

* * *

"I'm telling you it's true!" Issei insisted once more.

"Uh huh," Naruto returned with a roll of his eyes, though he was inwardly filing all the provided information away. "And that fountain's made of gold," he stated sarcastically while pointing at the park's water spout.

"I swear it upon the greatness of oppai that I'm telling the truth, Naruto!" the brown-haired boy declared while they walked through the park together. "I really _do _see better in the dark, and I really _can _hear things from far away."

"Prove it."

"Fine," Issei huffed in agreement. He then pointed towards a tree about one-hundred yards to the two friends' left and told the blonde, "I can hear a bird in that tree's braches, and – now that I'm focused on it – I can see that it's a swallow."

"Yeah, right –" Naruto started before his sharp eyes caught movement from the aforementioned tree and witnessed a red swallow fly out of its highest branches with a small chirp. "Huh. I guess you're really not pulling my leg, Issei."

_**So we know his sight and hearing have each been amplified at least tenfold now,**_ Kurama summarized for Naruto.

_And the only major difference is the new aura around him,_ Naruto continued. _Then the source of the energy change is most likely the cause of his senses becoming so acute. It's like he's using Chakra to enhance his senses._

_**It looks like things are getting a little less boring around here, eh, Naruto?**_

Before Naruto could even reply to his inner friend, a brief sense of vertigo washed over him that nearly made him fall over. The vertigo was accompanied by a small flash of nausea that he had to force down by using his iron-clad willpower.

"Whoa," Issei realized once he looked back at his friend. The brunette propped one of his hands on the bent-over Naruto's chest with his other on the blonde's back. "You okay, Naruto?"

"Y-Yeah," he replied with a small grimace. The former shinobi managed to right himself after a few deep breathes and stood back up. He smiled at his friend gratefully as he expressed his thanks, "Thanks, Issei. I'll be fine. Must've been something I ate."

"You really need to –" Issei began to scold, but Naruto's eyes went wide as his finely-tuned senses picked up something he hadn't felt since coming to this world: Killing Intent.

"Issei, down!" Naruto screamed as he pushed his confused friend down onto the ground just before two flashes of light went over their heads like a pair of projectile weapons. The two teenage boys rolled on the ground together for a moment until Naruto managed to separate himself from the now-frozen Issei and rolled himself into a crouch facing the direction the projectiles just came from.

The shinobi glared heatedly at the man he decided was the perpetrator of that last attack on Issei's person. The potential enemy was a middle-aged gentleman-looking man who stood at a slightly-above average height. This man's attire consisted of a pale-violet trench coat over a white dress shirt with a matching ascot, black pants and shoes, and a dark fedora sitting atop his head.

"I don't know who you are, but you're not who I'm after, human," the man addressed the battle-hardened warrior. "I'm after that Stray Devil over there."

_Stray Devil?_ Naruto briefly wondered before filing his words away to think on at a later moment. _He's obviously after Issei, but why?_

_**Think on that later,**_ Kurama reminded him. _**This man feels similar to that Yuuma girl, Naruto.**_

_You're right, Kurama,_ the whiskered blonde realized. "Who are you?" he demanded of the other man.

The man's beady dark-blue eyes narrowed at Naruto as he answered, "Nothing here concerns you, human. How you're still conscious and standing while my barrier is up is a mystery, but don't presume to meddle in affairs that don't concern you."

"The hell they don't!" the jinchuuriki shouted angrily. "You just tried to turn my friend into Issei-ka-bob! And _nobody_ hurts my friends," he finished in a feral growl.

The enemy let out a few chuckles in amusement while shaking his head a few times. "A human who thinks he's on par with a Fallen Angel? Laughable!" the trench-coat-wearing man exclaimed with a hearty bellow.

_Fallen Angel?_ the blonde thought on his words.

"Enough stalling," the Fallen Angel stated after calming his laughter. "Last chance, _human_. Leave that Stray Devil to me and forget you ever saw me, or else you will end up sharing his fate."

Naruto's cerulean orbs narrowed and he slid his feet into a battle-ready stance that he'd learned from the Toads as he replied stonily, "You want him, you gotta go through me."

An insane grin crossed over the Fallen Angel's face as he heard Naruto's answer to his warnings. "Very well," he agreed ominously. "If that's your wish, then you can join that devil in oblivion!" he declared with relish as a jagged spear with a two-pronged tip appeared in his hands and charged at the blonde.

_Fast!_ the shinobi realized as the enemy crossed the thirty yards between them in just over a full second. He then ducked under a horizontal swipe at his neck and countered quickly with a strong right fist buried into the man's gut. _But predictable,_ he finished with a grin as his enemy doubled over and gasped from breath.

Naruto quickly jumped back out of reach from that glowing spear while the Fallen Angel gathered himself. Mad chuckles that would've frozen most men came from the older enemy, but Naruto had dealt with Orochimaru's crazy cackling, so he felt no fear of the man.

"Naruto!" Issei exclaimed in shock, but Naruto's eyes never strayed from his opponent.

"Stay back, Issei," the shinobi ordered icily, making Issei freeze at his tone. "He's after you, and to do that he'll need to make it past me."

"But –"

"No 'buts!'" Naruto shouted intensely as his thoughts briefly ventured down an alley he'd rather they didn't. "I can handle this guy. Even without my chakra," he finished in an unheard mumble for himself.

"Is that so?" the Fallen Angel asked with a sense of superiority that made Naruto sick to his stomach. "Well then, why don't we test that!?" he screamed insanely as he threw his spear at the blonde.

Not feeling like testing out the type of damage that self-made weapon could dish out, Naruto ducked to the side before falling backwards into his hands in order to avoid the man's fist. He then utilized his flexibility to get out of the way of another punch and spear thrust before executing a back-handspring to separate himself from the opponent.

However, the Fallen Angel wasn't letting him get away, once he'd landed on his feet Naruto had to spin to his right in order to avoid another spear thrust. Naruto and his opponent then engaged in a deadly dance where the blonde ducked, spun, and twisted his body away from the new kunai-looking spear of his enemy while continually being forced to retreat backwards.

The jinchuuriki jumped back once more to avoid a particularly long swipe at his midsection and felt his back slam into something rough and much larger than him. Realizing that he'd been forced into backing against a tree, Naruto's eyes widened for an instant and the Fallen Angel smirked before thrusting his spear at the blonde's head.

The side of his mouth twitched before Naruto avoided the attack by simply leaning his head to the right and the first six inches of the spear's blade dug into the tree trunk behind him. The shinobi countered by hitting his foe with a faster-than-sight right cross that made the Fallen Angel stumble backwards, but he managed to keep a grip on his weapon. Naruto then reached up and grabbed the spear's shaft with his left hand tightly, used that hand-hold to vault himself off of the ground, and delivered a devastating right kick directly to the side of the man's face, making him leave the ground from the force used and sprawl out on the ground.

The spear then dissipated in the air while he'd still been holding it, forcing Naruto to spin in the air to counteract his momentum and land on one knee in a crouch. The blonde then stood up and sucked in a few greedy breaths as he felt his lungs burn from the effort he'd had to exert in the last ten minutes. "If _that _much got me _this _winded then I must really be losing my touch," he gasped out between rasps.

_**Just goes to show how much you shinobi all relied on chakra to enhance your abilities,**_Kurama pointed out lazily._** That guy was on par with a green Chuunin at best, and he actually put you on the ropes until he gave you that chance, Naruto.**_

_No,_ he petulantly denied while visualizing the smirk crossing Kurama's massive face. _ I was simply lulling him into a false sense of security so he'd let his guard down._

_**Whatever helps you sleep at night,**_ the fox snorted patronizingly.

_Well,_ he conceded to his friend, _it _has_ been six months since I actually was able to really, seriously, train…_

"Naruto!" Issei's frantic voice broke Naruto out of his mental debate and made him turn to see the brown-haired boy running over to his side.

"Are you okay, Issei?" Naruto asked with concern in his tone. "Any of his attacks end up hitting you?"

The golden-eyed youth shook his head in the negative before his eyes lit up and he began, "But that was so _cool_, Naruto! I didn't know you could fight like that! Why didn't you ever say you could? Can you teach me how to fight like that? How long have you been able to kick ass like that?"

"Okay, okay," Naruto stopped him before he hyperventilated. "Breathe, Issei." The boy did as instructed and Naruto began to answer, "To answer your questions: You never asked, I can teach you a little but not all, and for as long as I can remember."

"Sweet!" Issei proclaimed gleefully with stars in his eyes and a fist thrown into the air. "I'm buds with the biggest badass at Kuoh and nobody but me knows it!" he exclaimed as he began to make his way away from Naruto and towards the defeated Fallen Angel. "Now Naruto's gonna teach me how to be just as much of a badass and the girls won't be able to stay away from me. They'll be all, 'Oh, Issei! You're so _strong_! Please let me bear your children!' I'll finally achieve my dream of seeing a real pair of oppai without needing to peek!"

"Issei, you really shouldn't –" Naruto started to warn his friend, but his breath hitched as he saw the supposedly-unconscious man's fingers twitch. "Issei, move!" he commanded as his body moved towards his friend.

"You're mine, Devil!" the Fallen Angel screamed with glee as he suddenly sprouted two black, feathery wings and used them to lift his body from the ground before summoning one more spear of light and charging at the stunned Issei.

As the Fallen Angel beat his wings furiously and got closer far too fast for him to react, Issei could only close his eyes and hold his breath while awaiting his end. The sound of a wet 'splerch' caused the brown-haired youth to open his eyes and freeze in shock at the sight his eyes recorded for him.

Naruto stood in front of him with the man's kunai-shaped spear pierced completely through his stomach. The blonde stood strong as his fierce blue eyes glared at his killer with such complete fury in them that even Issei was cowed even though the look wasn't directed in his direction.

Both of the shinobi's shaking arms gripped the spear tightly and held it there. "You…will not…harm…_my_ _friend_!" Naruto howled at the Fallen Angel before pulling his left hand off of the spear and connecting a harsh uppercut into the enemy's jaw, sending the winged man into the air.

As the man flapped his wings once to steady himself in the air and set his jaw again, Naruto coughed out a thick glob of blood and fell to his knees while pain wracked his body. The spear of light then disappeared and the sudden lack of anything in his body forced the former shinobi to fall on the ground face-first while a puddle of blood began to pool beneath his shivering body.

_Damn it!_ he mentally cursed as his mind began to blank out. _Am I really going to die here? Kurama, can't you do your healing me thing?_

_**I only wish I could, Naruto,**_ Kurama responded with melancholy. _**However, without open tenketsu, my chakra can't flow through your body. Looks like this really is the end, kid.**_

A few moments of silence passed once Naruto felt that news sink in. _But…what'll happen to you?_ he asked timidly. _I mean, won't you just reform after a few years like you would back in the Elemental Nations?_

_**I doubt it, Naruto,**_ the biju answered with a resigned air. _**Back there, there was enough residual chakra in the air for a biju to reform after a few years, but here, where there isn't even the faintest whiff of chakra in the world…**_

_I'm sorry, Kurama,_ Naruto apologized to his friend. _My useless hero streak was the death of us both; just like you told me after the war._

_**Yeah,**_Kurama agreed sadly. _**I only wish it wasn't truly the end.**_

_Well, you know what that Headmaster called death in that book series I read after making it here, right?_

_**The Next Great Adventure.**_

The last thing Naruto's eyes recorded for him was a flash of bright, crimson light.

* * *

Rias Gremory and her peerage were preparing to make themselves known as soon as Hyoudou's friend, Naruto Uzumaki, had fallen to the Fallen Angel's Spear of Light.

"A pity," the despicable creature in the air spoke with a sneer. "He would've made a fine familiar."

Issei was still frozen at the sight he'd just been forced to witness, and Rias couldn't blame him at all for it. To watch as a close friend gave their life to save yours was supposed to be a very traumatic event.

_He must be in shock,_ the crimson-haired young woman thought with a slight frown. "Akeno, Kiba, Koneko," she then called, and all of the available members of her peerage looked to her. "Be ready. If the Fallen Angel makes another move towards Issei, then we will intervene."

"Hai, Buchou," each of them acknowledged with a nod.

_Show me a glimpse, Issei,_ Rias silently implored of him. _This should be more than enough to awaken your Sacred Gear. Show me why I had to use all eight Pawn Pieces on you._ She'd planned on helping him obtain his Sacred Gear after explaining everything about yesterday and today to him, but she recognized that this scene would likely be a shortcut for him to awaken his power. If anything, the Sacred Gear awakening would help convince him even more than just knowledge of who that Amano Yuuma girl really was to him.

"Well, I suppose that _is_ the fate of those who don't understand their weakness," the crow in the air mocked Uzumaki's sacrifice, making Rias clench her fist in anger.

_Such a sacrifice is _not_ to be mocked!_ she thought in rage.

"N-Naruto," Issei called out in a broken voice that hurt the Gremory heiress more than she thought it would. The stricken young man fell to his knees in the puddle of dark-red liquid, making the reflection of the moon ripple. "Come on, man," he nearly begged. "This isn't funny. Get up!" he cried out in desperation as a few tears fell from his golden eyes and dripped off of his chin. "Get up," he truly begged of the blonde on the ground, but there was no reaction from him at all.

Issei's tear-stained face then looked up into the distorted night sky and a bloodcurdling scream tore from his throat, and that scream made Rias' decision for her.

The azure-eyed beauty felt a tug on her skirt and looked down to see her Rook, Koneko, looking up at her with pleading eyes. "…Buchou?" she asked in her usual monotone, but Rias had been around the girl long enough to notice the sadness in her eyes. Uzumaki had been kind to her whenever she'd been caught tailing him under her King's orders.

The Gremory heiress simply nodded to her and assured, "Don't worry, Koneko. I will. He proved he has abilities we could use in his fight, and Uzumaki-kun's presence would help settle Issei back down after tonight." The Rook nodded in acceptance before both she and the busty woman resumed watching the scene play out.

"…_You,_" Issei growled out with such complete venom that it took Rias completely by surprise. "_You _did this," he accused of the Fallen Angel as the man landed on the ground.

The crow gave a sinister grin in response as he picked his fedora up off the ground, dusted it off with his hand, and put it back on his head. "Yes," he responded without remorse. "I killed that Devil-Lover, and you're next."

The Fallen Angel then created another Spear of Light and prepared to throw it at the unmoving, still-kneeling, Issei and Rias called to her Knight, "Kiba!"

"Right!" he acknowledged the order as he summoned one of his blades through using his own Sacred Gear, Sword Birth, and prepared to intervene should Issei be unable to protect himself.

Without needing to be told, Akeno summoned a few bolts of her lightning in her hand as she let out her customary, "Ara, ara."

Just as the Fallen Angel made to throw his spear at the still Pawn, Rias felt a power surge come from the newest member of her peerage. She let out a sigh in relief before growing a small smile as the power from the brown-haired boy's Sacred Gear caused the thrown Spear of Light to veer off-course for his heart and instead just barely sliced into his right arm.

Before Rias even needed to order and the crow could even react to what had just happened, Akeno, Kiba, and Koneko were on the move. Akeno served her role as Queen well as she shot off a warning shot of her lightning at the man which caused him to jump back to avoid it, only to feel the cold steel of one of Kiba's blades touching the center of his back before he could even move again. Koneko, knowing well what her role as Rook was, jumped in front of Issei and took a defensive stance while Rias slowly walked out from the shadows and stared at the Fallen Angel with an unreadable look on her face.

"Don't make another move, Fallen Angel-san," Rias spoke first with authority.

"K-Koneko-chan, Yuuto, Akeno-senpai, and Rias-senpai?" Issei realized with his eyes wide in shock. "What're you –" He was cut off as his eyes rolled back into his head and he fell over. Koneko caught him and gently laid the unconscious boy on the ground as flashes of red disappeared from his left arm.

A small grin made its way onto the heiress' face as she thought, _So I was right, but the trauma from what he's just experienced was simply too much for his mind to take in all at once. He'll need to be healed tonight._

"I see," the winged man realized after shaking himself from his shocked stupor at seeing the group appear almost instantaneously. "That hair of yours. You're from the Gremory family, aren't you?"

"I am Rias Gremory," she stated for him, "and if I were you I wouldn't make any sudden movements, Fallen Angel-san."

"I admit I had no idea that this was the Gremory heiress' jurisdiction," the man revealed while keeping his hands open and out to the side. "I'm guessing that the devil over there is one of yours?"

"Indeed he is," Rias told him, "and I will show no mercy towards you if you should come after him again."

"Well, it seems I must apologize for thinking he was a Stray," the Fallen Angel spoke with hardly any regret present in his voice at all. "However, I would recommend you keep a tighter leash on your servant's collar, or else someone like me might just spot him and decide to go on a little Devil Hunt."

"I appreciate the helpful advice," she returned with just as much false-politeness as her verbal sparring partner. "But allow me to issue you a warning as well: Should you or your ilk ever attempt something like this, it will be the last mistake you ever make," she promised with a look that could've cut glass from its sharpness.

"The same to you, Gremory," he returned before slowly walking away from Kiba's blade, using his wings to fly off, and disappear into the night while dispelling his minimal barrier. "My name is Dohnaseek," he warned them all. "Pray we never meet again, devils."

Rias paid no heed to the warning of such a mediocre crow and instead turned towards her Rook and called, "Koneko, how is Issei?"

"Out cold," the white-haired girl responded. "Scratch is only visible wound."

"But Uzumaki-kun's death would hurt him more than any weapon of Light could," Kiba spoke in. "Aside from Motohama-kun and Matsuda-kun, Uzumaki-kun is Issei-kun's closest friend."

"Indeed," the crimson-haired girl agreed. She then turned to her Queen and asked of her, "Akeno, is Uzumaki-kun truly deceased?"

"Not yet," the dark-haired beauty answered, "but he will be very soon if he isn't healed immediately. Luckily, he wasn't a devil when he got stabbed, or else he'd already be gone."

"Will you save Uzumaki-senpai?" Koneko asked as the Gremory heiress walked over and joined her Queen in standing over the nearly-deceased form of Naruto Uzumaki.

"I will," she told them all, much to all of their relief – Koneko even let out the breath she'd been holding. "However, I want you, Akeno, to take Issei home and heal him overnight. When he wakes up, I want you to explain to him how he's now a Devil and is a member of my peerage, just like you. I leave it up to you how you explain it, but don't physically scar my newest servant."

"Ara, ara," Akeno let out a few of her prim giggles. "So _mental_ scarring is okay, Buchou?"

"Like I said, I leave it up to you. Just don't turn him gay, though."

"Uh… I don't think that's physically possible, Buchou," Kiba intoned nervously.

"Hentai," the smallest of them all agreed.

"Ara, ara," the raven-haired beauty continued to giggle as she collected Issei in her arms and extended both of her Devil Wings. "Come along, Issei-kun. Akeno-senpai has _lots_ of _instructing_ to do." She then flew off while Rias felt a small shiver travel down her back as she suddenly got a bad feeling that decision wasn't going to go over well.

She quickly shook herself of those thoughts, however, as there were more important things to do at the moment. The Gremory heiress then kneeled down and looked at the face of the blonde second-year. _I've always wondered if those were just tattoos,_ she thought before reaching one of her hands down and tracing one of the whisker-like markings on his cheeks. _Well I'll be,_ she thought in awe,_ they're not tattoos._

For the past four months she'd kept tabs on the boy who'd been personally sponsored by her elder brother at Kuoh Academy. Sirzechs nor Grayfia had been forthcoming with answers as to why Naruto had gained the Maou's attention, and the lack of answers had only intrigued her even more.

Rias had asked Kiba to try and get close to Naruto when the new term had begun, but the unknown blonde had wisely decided to keep the Knight at a distance and instead decided to befriend Issei. Kiba had revealed that Naruto had the walk and situational awareness of a warrior who'd seen around as much battle as his own sensei, and that was truly saying something if it was true. The only real information that Rias had been able to gather about the enigmatic blonde was only what it seemed _he_ was willing to allow her to see, which frustrated her to no end.

He was not only smart when it comes to his classes, but he was truly intelligent and ingenious in his methodology whenever he detected and decided to lose the tail she'd placed on him two months back. While Rias' bat-familiar wasn't as intelligent as, say, a Sprite Dragon, her familiar was not unintelligent herself. For a single human without even the smallest hint of either innate magic or even a Sacred Gear to not only _realize_ he was being followed by an invisible bat but also to _lose them at will_ was a feat Rias couldn't even believe with her own eyes.

Shaking her head of those musings, Rias pulled out her Devil's Devious Network – or D.D.N. – device and pointed it at the bleeding blonde teen. Since she'd gotten no feelings at all from him when she'd extended her aura to examine him to see just what the cost would be for him she was forced to do things the old-fashioned way. The crimson-haired heiress then pressed a few buttons on the display screen and awaited the device to finish its scan and calculate the exact value of Naruto in terms of Evil Pieces.

"Huh?" Rias was dumbfounded as the device showed in bold red letters, 'ERROR.' "Hunk of junk must be broken," she mumbled tersely as she then put it away into a magic circle. "I guess it's guess and check then. I really hate this method though.

"We'll start with the Knight," she told the unhearing blonde on the ground. "You proved you're already quite quick, Naruto, so I suppose that a Knight's speed would make you just as if not even faster than Kiba."

The heiress then took out a horse-headed, red glass Chess piece and placed it on top of the boy's chest right above his heart. She then summoned all of her magic and demonic power forward in order to create the appropriate magic circle.

A large, red Magic Circle appeared above Naruto's prone body and Rias began the appropriate chant to make Naruto into a Reincarnated Devil. "I, Rias Gremory, do hereby order you in my name: Heed my call, Naruto Uzumaki! Tie your soul to this world and become a devil of my House. You shall become my Knight, and rejoice in your new life!"

However when she opened her eyes and looked down, Rias was positively flabbergasted to discover that literally nothing had changed from when before she'd begun the chant. The magic circle still remained circling above the semi-dead teen and the Evil Piece hadn't even reacted to the ritual at all. It was as if she'd just tried to turn a stone into her Knight!

"Uh… Was that supposed to happen, Buchou?" Kiba asked nervously.

"…Trouble?" Koneko queried.

"At the very least there should've been _something_," Rias grumbled to herself as she tuned out her two present servants. "A sign of rejection, not enough value in the Piece, _something_! I've never even_ heard_ of this complete lack of the reaction before. Maybe the Rook will work instead? It is worth two more in value than the Knight. It should at least be worth a try…"

The heiress then took out her red Rook Piece and exchanged its place with the Knight Piece. Rias followed that action by repeating the process with the Rook, but was rewarded with another no-reaction.

"Bishop!" she tried.

Nothing.

"Knight _and_ Bishop!"

Nothing again.

"Knight _and _Rook!"

Nothing once more.

"Bishop _and _Rook!"

Nada.

"Knight, Bishop, _and Rook!_"

Zippo.

"What is _wrong_ with you!?" she shrieked in frustration at the oblivious blonde while she let out a few pants from the exertion trying to do what she'd just attempted did to her energy reserves. "Evil Pieces were _made _to reincarnate _anything_ from this dimension into a Devil! Humans, Youkai, Dragons, it doesn't matter! So long as it lives, the Evil Pieces can work on it! And I got mine from Beelzebub-sama himself! Ugh! If only I'd had another Mutation Piece besides Gasper's!" She then stopped cold and blinked dumbly as her last statement finally registered in her mind and it caused her to remember something. "Oh, wait. I do have another one."

She then reached into her uniform's pocket and pulled out an Evil Piece she'd only received two weeks ago. Sirzechs had assured her that it would serve its purpose in reincarnating someone, but since it had the same reaction to Issei that all her current Pieces had just had to Naruto she'd assumed that it was just a faulty piece.

"Maybe _you're _supposed to work here," she spoke to the Piece. "It's not like anything _else_ is working here…"

An unspoken rule about the Evil Piece system was that each Evil Piece looked exactly like the Chess pieces that the system based off of. The Pawns looked like the pawn, the Bishops looked like the bishop, and so on and so forth. Even the standard Mutation Pieces like the chess piece they were originally based off of before they absorbed the powers of other Pieces.

This one, however, didn't resemble any known chess piece at all. It had an odd swirl-fashion outer armor that coiled up the Pieces three-inch length until it reached the peak, where two horn-like protrusions extended out perpendicular to one another. While Rias had no idea as to what she was supposed to claim this Piece as, she somehow felt like there was some kind of connection between the Piece she held and the blonde on the ground now that she focused on the Piece.

"Well, let's see if this works," she mused aloud. The Gremory heiress then placed the unnamed Piece onto the blonde's chest over his heart and chanted, "I, Rias Gremory, do hereby command you in my name: Heed my call, Naruto Uzumaki! Tie your soul to this world and become a devil of my House. You shall become my Devil and rejoice in your new life!"

A small tug of her lips' corners was the only outward sign that Rias was in fact pleased by the sight as she watched the unique Piece glow brightly in response to her call. The slowly-spinning magic circle then began to descend towards the whiskered teen and continued on through his body until it ceased its drop once it reached the concrete below him. To signal the end of the ceremony, the unique Piece flashed brightly once and then sank into the blonde's chest and bonded with his very DNA.

An exhausted sigh came from the crimson-haired beauty as she let her arms fall down to her side. She then called to Koneko, "Can you check on him for me, please? I'm too exhausted to trust my senses right now."

"Hai, Buchou," Koneko answered her. The Rook then walked over to Naruto and kneeled down at his side. She gave him a cursory once-over with her heightened senses and innate Nekomata abilities before checking his vitals with her fingers and saying, "Alive. He'll make it."

"What a relief," Rias spoke as she let out a thankful breath.

"But the wound isn't healing."

"What did you say, Koneko?" Kiba asked of the youngest in the group before their Master could.

"Funny feeling from it," the cat-like girl explained briefly while pointing at the open would. "Will need healing as well."

"It could just be his body's reaction to the residual Light particles left from that spear," the blonde swordsman offered a possible explanation.

Koneko merely shook her head and repeated, "Funny feeling. Not from Fallen Angel. Not sure from where. Wasn't there before ritual though."

"While you _could_ be right, Kiba," Rias chimed in before the two could continue, "I'd rather not take the chance. The Piece I just used on Uzumaki-kun here was a Unique Piece Onii-sama gave me two weeks ago through Grayfia. I never got any explanation of it out of her though, so we don't know how the Piece will react to his body. It would most likely be safest if I take him home and heal his wounds overnight."

"But Buchou –"

"I appreciate your concern, Kiba," she stopped him before he could offer his protest with a small smile on her face. "Really, I do. However, me staying with Uzumaki-kun is not just so I can heal his body. It lets me be the first person he sees in the morning so that I can answer any immediately-concerning questions he no doubt will have. In cases of unknowing reincarnation – like both Issei and Uzumaki-kun are – it is better for the Master or someone the Master trusts absolutely to explain their situation to them in order to prevent them from drawing incorrect conclusions.

"Now then," she then directed to her two servants. "You two go on home and get some sleep. I'll contact you tomorrow after Akeno and I have spoken about what will have happened tomorrow morning and decide on an action to take."

"Hai, Buchou," Kiba accepted reluctantly while Koneko merely gave the King a nod in response. The pair of Devils then each summoned a magic circle and teleported on to their individual homes.

"Now for you," Rias turned towards the steadily-breathing almost-corpse. She then started digging around in his pants and jacket for some kind of identity so she could find an address since she'd never been able to find his actual living address before – not even Sona's records had one. "Aha!" she exclaimed victoriously after finding his I.D. card deep in his pants' left pocket. "Now, to get you home and healed up."

Focusing on the address on the I.D., she summoned a teleportation magic circle and the two Devils disappeared from the park, with only a puddle of blood reflecting the moon's pale glow as a sign that anything had occurred that night at all.

Rias didn't notice the faint outline of red that covered Naruto's wound's inner walls.

* * *

**A/N:** Well, this is the newest child of mine for all of my loyal readers to read. I have been in LOVE with Highschool DxD ever since the anime came out, and I really, REALLY wanted to come up with some way to write a story, but I never could think up a way to spin that world other than how it'd already been written. I got the idea for the crossover actually when I started writing my Naruto fic and became obsessed with crossovers.

I hope you all enjoyed the first chapter, and I really pray all of you hop on the wagon that is the _Shadow of the Devil_ and enjoy the ride with me!

dripley11

**P.S.** Okay, since so many people don't seem to understand what I did, I will spell it out for you: Naruto didn't _lose_ his chakra, he lost the ability to _use_ it. As explained when the Byakugan's abilities are shown in canon, the tenketsu are what allows the Chakra to be used in the external world and create ninjutsu, genjutsu, and even some taijutsu techniques. With closed tenketsu, Naruto isn't able to actively make use of his chakra, but he still has it; it's just been locked away. Why was he still alive you ask? If you want to know, then you'll need to stick with the story, because I'm done explaining things.

There. I hope you all are happy now. Also, congratulations to the reviewers and other readers who were able to piece it together by looking underneath the underneath and not assuming I don't have any reason aside from 'OMG! I'm going to make Naruto so WEAK so that he can be killed and Rias can turn him into a Devil!'

I apologize for the blunt nature of my Post Scriptum, but I was getting tired of getting flames in my reviews claiming I didn't know what I was doing when I _do_, in fact. Unlike many, I meticulously plan out each and every one of my stories before I even write them.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

* * *

The sound of water droplets dripping into an even larger pool of liquid echoed off the humongous chamber's solid walls.

A single drop fell from the room's ceiling and splattered over Naruto's whiskered left cheek, making his face twitch in reaction. His cerulean eyes then slowly creaked open and both orbs sent to his mind his current location.

"**About time you wake,"** a deep, powerful, booming voice rumbled from seemingly all around him. **"You're lucky I'm so patient with you, kid."**

The spiky-haired blonde then sat up slowly while letting out a tired moan and rubbing at his eyes. "Kurama?" he asked into the darkness. "That you, buddy?"

"**It is I,"** Kurama's voice echoed in answer.

"Then I guess I'm in my mindscape again," he mused as he made his way to his sandaled feet. "How long has it been since I've been here?" he asked nobody while looking at his surroundings with a critical eye. "Really need to fix this place up."

"**It is your **_**mind**_**, Naruto,"** the mountainous fox reminded him. **"This is a physical representation of how your mind is, and it is adequately a sewer."**

"Doesn't mean I don't wanna try," the whiskered teen replied with his traditional toothy grin. "But what am I here for?" he queried as he turned towards the unlocked and open Seal and began to trudge through the ankle-deep water towards his friend. "I mean, not that it isn't great to see you and all, Kurama, but you told me you didn't want to risk it with my Chakra System closed off."

"**You died,"** Kurama stated flatly with a lazy flick of one of his tree-sized tails, causing Naruto to freeze stiff at this information. **"Or rather, it would be more precise to say you nearly met the Shinigami, but were instead recreated."**

The former shinobi took down an audible gulp before asking hesitantly, "So…So it really wasn't a dream then? I really did –"

"**Yes,"** his friend's booming voice confirmed before he opened one of his blood-red irises and let out a monstrous yawn. **"You really did do battle with a man that had a crow's wings and he did defeat you."**

"Only because he played possum and went after a defenseless Issei," Naruto pointed out.

"**Indeed,"** the fox conceded. **"However, that doesn't change the fact of what really occurred. Naruto, you were willing to give your life to save your friend's, but tell me: Did you **_**ever**_** stop to think about what that would mean for **_**US!?"**_ the Kyuubi roared in anger while his tails flailed about behind him.

"Uh…whattaya mean?"

Kurama took in a calming breath before continuing in a much calmer tone, **"Naruto, we are not from this world. Which most likely means that there would be no afterlife for us."** Naruto's tanned face paled while his friend kept on going, **"What I mean is this: Had you truly ended up dead, the two of us would have most likely just…ceased to exist altogether. No seeing our friends and family. Just…**_**gone**_**.**

"**Now, even though you have been unable to physically use chakra, yours and my chakra systems are still intertwined. That means, **_**again**_**, that your Chakra System will give you both my vitality and constitution, which would make you practically immune to the aging effects all humans have to deal with eventually. Ever since we regained and combined both halves of my spirit and chakra from that pestering Shinigami, my chakra's potency has skyrocketed, which has made you on par with jiji when you go all-out – Toad Senjutsu plus me and your skills. **

"**So…tell me why in all the **_**hells **_**did you take that spear to the gut!?"** the kitsune roared so loud that the secret chamber shook from its strength.

"I wasn't gonna let Issei die when I could've saved him," Naruto answered steadily, his face unflinching in front of the walking natural disaster.

"**Your fiancée was right,"** Kurama reminded him with anger, making a brief flash of hurt cross the blonde's face at the memory of his old love, **"you truly **_**are**_** a dolt! There were observers to your battle with that 'Fallen Angel,' Naruto!"**

The cerulean-eyed boy blinked dumbly in shock as he lamely asked in response to that bit of news, "…Huh?"

"**There were four others watching your idiotic actions,"**the fox informed him. **"All of them had a similar aura to your friend's – I'm guessing that crow-man's term 'Stray Devil' applies. Two of them were familiar to me: that cat-like girl –"**

"Koneko-chan," Uzumaki intoned.

" – **and that blonde with the curse of fangirls,"** the orange giant finished, unperturbed by the interruption.

"That'd be Kiba Yuuto," Naruto told his friend. "You know, it isn't really that hard to remember their names, Kurama."

"**What do I care?"** he sniffed derisively in response to the blonde's point. **"I'm not the one speaking with them."**

"What about the other two?" the whiskered shinobi asked. "You said that there were _four _observers. Kiba and Koneko only make two."

"**The other two I didn't recognize, but I do know I've felt their presences at your 'school' before,"** Kurama answered. **"Both of their auras made me believe they are much more powerful than that 'Fallen Angel' or any of the other supposed 'Stray Devils.' To make it so you could understand: those two were Jounin compared to the Genin-to-Chuunin rank of the others."**

"So they'd be the leaders of this group of 'Stray Devils,' then?" Naruto figured aloud.

"**That'd be my guess," **the orange fox confirmed.

"So what you're saying is I shouldn't have gotten in that fight at all?" the blonde guessed at what his friend's point was for all this.

"**No,"** the giant biju denied, making the shinobi blink in confusion at this turn of events. **"Those four presences didn't arrive until after you engaged that crow-man. What I'm saying is that you needn't have taken that spear to the stomach. My guess is that – even if Issei wasn't aware of it – he now belongs to this group of 'Stray Devils' and they came to assist him against that 'Fallen Angel.' It is plainly obvious that the Jiraiya-reincarnation doesn't have a clue on how to defend himself in **_**real**_** combat."**

"That's true," Naruto chuckled while smiling as he remembered his time with his Godfather. He then stopped once he realized something and shouted, "You said someone _recreated_ me!?"

"**Seventeen and you're still that slow how?"** Kurama asked rhetorically with a small shake of his huge head, making the blonde grumble under his breath at the jab. **"Yes, someone did do something to your body, Naruto."**

"What!?" he screamed as he began to panic as he recalled all the torturous experiences his former sensei had gotten the two of them into on their training trip. His mind continued to come up with worse and worse possibilities as he continued to shriek, "Oh my God, what'd they do!? What'd they do!? Am I still me!? Am I still a _boy_!?"

"**Be silent, Naruto!"** the giant ordered in a bellow that made the panicky blonde cease his sprinting around. **"Now, from what I can tell, very little – if any – alterations have been made to your physical form."**

"Oh, thank heaven," he breathed out in relief, only to get a sharp pain in his head. "Ow! What the hell was that for!?" he demanded of his friend.

"**I didn't do anything to you,"** the kitsune denied with a slight wince as well. **"All I can tell you is that it came from **_**outside**_**."**

"Then why the hell do I feel like 'Baa-chan just kicked me upside the head!?

"**How should I know?"**

"Isn't it kind of your job to know everything?" Naruto quipped.

"**Hardly,"** Kurama told him lazily as he returned to laying on his haunches while his tails curled about his body. **"I don't really know anything about this world. The only thing I **_**can**_** tell you, though, is that something happened last night after you blacked out and that the inner workings of your body are different from before."**

"How so?" he asked with a serious look on his face. _Ero-sennin always told me to take care of my body and to know it inside and out._

"**I'm not entirely certain,"** the orange-furred biju answered him. **"There seem to be a few modifications to your Chakra Network. From what I can tell, all Eight Gates seem to be open now,"** Naruto's eyes suddenly went wide from the shock caused by hearing this, **"but there also doesn't appear to be any negative effects on your body from this development. Also, possibly because of the Gates being open perpetually, your Chakra Network is flowing much stronger and faster than before."**

"Wow," the blue-eyed teen breathed out in wonder as he began to feel overwhelmed from hearing that piece of news. _So I'm gonna be a walking, talking middle-finger to Bushy Brow's and Bushier Brow-sensei's ultimate kinjutsu? Sweet! _he thought with a grin on his face. "So what does all that mean, Kurama?"

"**I would think that it means all of your chakra-based abilities will need to be relearned due to how potent your chakra has suddenly become,"** he replied. **"Should you attempt a Rasengan as you are now, you'd end up blowing your arm clean off from the shoulder down."**

"Sweet," the shinobi grinned his vulpine smile. He then thought about that and frowned before asking, "So I'm guessing that means I'm gonna need to learn the basics again, doesn't it?"

Kurama's toothy, foxy grin was all the answer he needed.

"_Crap!_" Naruto groaned. "I _hated_ tree-walking. And there's not even any trees that I can practice on!"

"**Then I would recommend only using your taijutsu for now,"** Kurama advised. **"While I don't doubt your speed and strength have wildly increased, they should be easy for you to adjust to. A week at most, I think. Using some of your father's Seals would no doubt help to contain this new physical prowess as well."**

Naruto rolled his eyes in an exasperated fashion before reminding Kurama, "Even if they _could_, all my stuff from back in Konoha is sealed away, and – since you seem to have forgotten – I can't access any of it without being able to use chakra on the fuuinjutsu."

One of the biju's mighty, human-like hands then came up and smacked his face at hearing Naruto's 'reminder.' **"How can one single human be this dense?"** he mumbled while running his hand down his snout. **"You're an imbecile Naruto,"** he berated, making Naruto let out an indignant 'Oi!' **"And I really can't believe I've got to spell this out when I've practically told you already, but here we go: Your tenketsu are all open now."**

The silence that followed that revelation was practically deafening in the chamber. Naruto was stuck standing there stock-still while the eerie 'drip' of water into the pool at his feet echoed. The blonde's eyes were as large as aquamarine dinner plates and his mouth opened and closed periodically without uttering any coherent words for a few minutes.

"You-You-You mean…I CAN USE CHAKRA AGAIN!?" the shinobi finally managed to piece together in a scream of disbelief.

"**Indeed, you utterly dense buffoon,"** Kurama confirmed lazily. **"I'm starting to think this world's science is right about humans being closely related to chimps. **_**You're**_** certainly as idiotic as that damned monkey Son Goku."**

* * *

Naruto raised his right arm over his eyes in order to prevent the early-morning sun's rays from blinding his sleep-addled retinas. In an attempt to retreat, he attempted to completely turn his body away from the window and onto his stomach, but found he couldn't due to something keeping his left side still.

Now realizing that there was a source of warmth to his left, Naruto opened his eyes and turned his head that way. Whatever was the cause of the heat was clutching onto his left arm tightly and refused to let him go no matter how much he attempted to gently remove his appendage from underneath the orange comforter.

Slightly shifting in the bed, a single lock of a unique shade of hair poked out from beneath the sheets. Not registering the color but now curious as to whom his apparent bed-sharer was, Naruto then reached across his body with his free hand, gripped the edge of the bed sheet, and pulled it down just enough to reveal the heat-source's hair and face.

The teenaged blonde sucked in a sharp breath and his mind completely awoke while simultaneously freezing at the same moment that he was able to place a name to that beautiful face: Rias Gremory. A few strands of a disheveled, bed-headed mane of crimson fell around her stunning heart-shaped face and framed the sleeping beauty's face wonderfully as a few rays from the morning sun shone upon her slightly parted lips as they slowly breathed in and out in her rest.

_My God, she's an angel!_ he couldn't help but think before wincing as another headache suddenly made itself known to him. After being able to shake the pain off, the blonde then somehow managed to tear his gaze away from the sight of perfection on his left and stared directly upwards at the off-white ceiling of his bedroom above him. _Kurama,_ he then called to his tenant, _did the two of us…?_

_**Not that I know,**_ the biju answered him.

The blue-eyed teen then peeked under the portion of the covers covering him and it became glaringly obvious that his body was certainly pleased with his bed-mate's presence. _Well…I'm naked,_ he made known while somehow not freaking out. The former shinobi then briefly glanced over towards his left and he thought aloud, "Did she…"

"No, we didn't," a voice he didn't recognize came from his left, making him blink in surprise since he hadn't felt her shift at all on the bed. "In case you're wondering, I didn't steal your virginity, Uzumaki-kun, though some do tend to think that we still do that."

Not really knowing how else to react, he turned towards the now-smirking and _very _naked – now that he got a good look at her and could feel skin-on-skin on his left arm – woman holding onto his left arm like it was a body-pillow and greeted with a small smile, "Good morning. Did you sleep well? And kinda' hard to steal something that doesn't exist anymore."

"Good morning to you, too," the crimson-haired goddess returned with a warm smile on her face, "and I did once I finished your healing. Also, _so_ many girls will be disheartened to hear that, Uzumaki-kun," she finished while flashing him a playful smirk.

"Just Naruto is fine," he insisted. "I mean, if we've shared a bed together naked, I think we can call each other by our first names. Don't you agree, Rias-chan?" he finished with a foxy grin stretching his whiskered cheeks.

The gorgeous woman grew a dangerous grin before she leaned her head over and whispered directly into his ear, "I suppose so, _Naruto-kun_."

_Good heavens!_ he thought with wide eyes as a shiver traveled down his spine. "Are-Are you _absolutely_ certain we didn't do it?" he hurriedly asked.

"Not while I was awake," she answered him. "Hold on a minute while I check." Rias then let go of his arm and turned her body to where she was facing away from him, only now her _very fine_ rear-end was being pushed directly into Naruto's leg.

_Holy SHIT!_ the blonde youth mentally screamed as he began to feel exceptionally flustered now. _Not even Sakura's was – _

"We didn't," the young woman assured him while tossing the slightly red-faced teen a smirk over her shoulder. She then pushed herself up off of the mattress and sat up while stretching her arms over her head and arching her back like a cat, all the meanwhile unashamedly granting Naruto a _perfect_ view of her assets.

The whiskered teen quickly turned his body onto its right side and curled his legs in a vain hope of hiding his little friend down below. He then shut his eyes tight while a single thought made itself known in his head after seeing that perfect pair of breasts, _Mama._

_**By jiji's horns**,_ Kurama spoke up in awe. _**This woman is even more brazen that I thought possible in this world. I never thought a human** – _The voice in Naruto's head then cut off suddenly, making the shinobi wonder as to why.

_Kurama?_ he called to his friend. _You okay there, buddy? I know she's got an amazing pair on her and all that might've actually made even Anko jealous, but I never thought it'd affect you._

_**Stupid!**_ the fox howled in his head, making Naruto grimace at the volume. _**I can't believe I didn't recognize it! Naruto, look, she's – **_

"Are you alright, Naruto-kun," Rias asked from her position on the bed that hadn't shifted in the slightest since he'd assumed the fetal position. "No doubt you have many questions you wish to ask. Now is the time."

"D-Don't you wanna take a shower and freshen up first?" he offered while refusing to turn his head for fear of being caught staring. He'd seen what Tsunade did to Jiraiya every time she'd caught the old pervert gawking, and had no desire to even take that risk. "I-I can make breakfast if you want. Pancakes sound fine?"

"That does sound delicious, but I've never been one to procrastinate," she shot down his attempt to buy time to regain his composure and control his…_other_ brain. "I can take a shower at the clubhouse after we make it to school, as I don't think you have a lady's bathroom necessities."

_Shit! How can I turn this situation around?_ he thought in a panic. The blonde then added on, _And why do I suddenly feel like I'm in one of Ero-sennin's books all-of-a-sudden!?_

"Come now," Rias chided politely, and Naruto could just sense that she was looking at him with a victorious grin and with her hands on her hips. "School is in a few hours, Naruto-kun. We don't have all day to do this, you know?"

"Get dressed," he mumbled as a request.

"Why?"

"…Can't focus."

The crimson-haired beauty let out a melodious laugh at his childish-sounding reply, causing his cheeks to burn while he hid them from her sight. "Okay," she conceded to him, making him let out a sigh in relief. The young woman let out a few more chuckles at his expense, making the embarrassed boy pout. "Can you hand me my underwear then? I left them on the bedside table next to you."

Shutting his cerulean eyes tight and willing himself to not think about just what kind of underwear she'd wear, Naruto blindly reached his hand out towards his nightstand and began the search for the appropriate garments. After a few minutes of fumbling around, knocking over and hearing objects break on the floor, grumbling curses under his breath, and bearing Rias' laugher at him, his lone hand enclosed over a pair of silky-fabric pieces of cloth that he was able to recognize as a woman's bra and panties. He immediately shot his hand above his torso and waited for his still-laughing bed-mate to take her underwear and put it on.

A still-chuckling young beauty took her clothes from the stiff blonde with a smile he just _knew _was on her face based on past experience. While he may not be a virgin anymore, he'd never been able to get comfortable with being in the same bed as someone he'd not remembered climbing into with in the first place. _Anko-sensei's greatest disappointment in that department,_ Naruto recalled sadly with a small frown.

The sound of fabric rustling behind him preceded Rias finally telling him the words he wanted to hear, but would never want to hear if this situation happened to be different, "Okay, I'm not nude anymore, Naruto-kun. It is safe to look."

"You'll have to forgive me if I sound skeptical," he grumbled back making her chuckle once more. "I've seen what the Kendo Club does to Issei when they catch him." _Damn you, Ero-sennin!_ he mentally screamed as he just couldn't help but picture his godfather's grinning face. _Now I won't ever be able to look at Rias-chan without picturing her naked!_ Try as hard as Sakura had, not even _her _strength could rid Naruto of corruption that ran _that _deep.

"Regardless, we're burning daylight," Rias insisted. "You have questions to ask, and I have answers to give. To start with: All you experienced last night was, in fact, real."

"…I already know," Naruto responded steadily while still remaining cradled, still refusing to look at the now-barely-clothed beauty in his bed for fear of retribution.

"Well, you're not in denial then," the youthful girl noted out loud. "Good. That takes care of the hardest part of finding out you're now one of my servant devils."

The whiskered blonde's cerulean eyes blinked dumbly in response as he was stunned from her words. "…Come again?" he asked after a brief moment of silence.

"I said that it was good you weren't in denial, since that's the hardest part," she replied with a hint of amusement in her tone.

"No, no," he told her, finally managing to sit up in the bed before turning around and creating and maintaining direct eye-to-eye contact. His own blue eyes stared right into her amused azure pair and he queried with a curious edge, "That last part."

The corner of the crimson-haired woman's mouth twitched upwards and she repeated for him, "You're now a Devil, Naruto Uzumaki. A Reincarnated Devil belonging to my House."

"I thought that was what you said," he responded to her statement with a small nod. The former Hokage heir-apparent took in a deep, steadying breath to hold in his temper at her words as he felt a feeling of rage begin to build up. _Calm down, Naruto,_ he told himself. _You don't have all the information yet. Let's not jump to conclusions here._ "Why don't we continue this in the living room, Rias-chan? Neither of us are dressed for a reality-shattering conversation, and I usually make it a point to never make any stupid decisions until _after _I've had my morning shower."

"What a coincidence," she replied with a grin, "so do I."

"Then you won't mind waiting a little bit while I clean myself up from last night."

"Not at all," she told him with a small smile. The devil-girl then climbed off of the bed and collected her clothing. "I'll be waiting, Naruto-kun," she told him with a teasing smile as she left his bedroom with a sway in her step.

The shinobi let out a sigh as he then climbed out of his bed with him absently thinking, _Now I'm gonna need to wash my sheets again…_ He then went over and into his bedroom-attached bathroom, climbed in the shower after grabbing a fresh towel, turned the shower up to its hottest setting, and began to go through his morning routine like always.

_**Naruto,**_ Kurama called to him.

_Yeah,_ he returned.

_**What I was about to say before that Rias girl interrupted was this: She was there last night.**_

_I'm guessing that she was one of the two presences you couldn't place a face to,_ Naruto provided as he squeezed his nearly-empty shampoo bottle into his hand before running the hair-care product through his naturally-spiky locks.

_**Indeed,**_ the fox confirmed for him. _**And if I'm right, then she's the strongest out of that entire group of 'Devils.'**_

The blonde let out a breath as he simply stood under the shower-head and allowed the hot water to run down his body while he kept his eyes closed. _Then she may not be lying, after all,_ he figured. _Most likely, Issei had a similar moment a few days ago on his date and she 'saved' him the same way she apparently did me._

_**By making you both into her servants as devils,**_ Kurama concluded.

_Let's check my body and see if there's anything aside from what you already told me about that seems…out of place,_ Naruto suggested. _Since you're technically a part of my Chakra Network now, can you run a diagnostic for me?_

_**Already am,**_ the biju informed him. _**Aside from what I could find last night while you were semi-dead, I see two major differences in your body now.**_

_Okay,_ the whiskered teen replied as he turned off his shower and was temporarily blinded by the steam as he opened the frosted-glass stall. _What are they?_

_**Well, for one,**_ the inner fox began,_** this first one seemingly has nothing to do with your Chakra Circulatory System. This one seems to be a type of Natural Energy reserve of some kind. Too small for you to store Senjutsu Chakra with, though.**_

_I'd heard rumors of devil's magic being studied in the Occult Research Club before,_ the shinobi offered a potential explanation as he dried his hair with his blue towel,_ which – now that I think about it – Rias-chan is the Club Buchou. Maybe it's supposed to be my reservoir for Magic Power as a Devil?_

_**Probable,**_ the biju told him, _**and that explanation makes sense. This other bodily alteration I think you can see for yourself.**_

The blonde youth rose an inquisitive eyebrow at his reflection after running his hand down the fogged mirror and he asked aloud, "How?"

_**Try and focus your mind just below your back's shoulder-blades and you'll see. I think we'll both like this addition.**_

"Can't hurt," Naruto figured with a shrug. He then did as his friend had instructed and the results of his action made his eyes shoot open and surprise. "Holy…shit. I've got _wings_!"

The awed teen focused his back muscles on attempting to flap his two jet-black, bat-like wings once, and the following gust of wind caused numerous objects and affects to fall over and/or spill in his bathroom. He then reached out one of his hands and ran it down the new appendage's length, noting that it felt rather leathery.

"Oi, Kurama."

_**Yes?**_

_Did that manual in my instincts tell you how to get rid of these things. I mean, they're cool and all, but I think showing up at school with my wings out would probably freak quite a few people out._

Naruto could picture his foxy friend rolling his eyes in response while the biju told him, _**Just do what you did to get them out, but in the reverse. That should do it.**_

_It did,_ the teenaged, newly reincarnated-devil told his friend once he'd successfully hidden his wings once more. _And you were right, flying does seem pretty cool, Kurama._

_**Hah!**_ the biju exclaimed from within his head, suddenly sounding quite pleased for some reason. _**Take that**__**, Chomei, you insignificant beetle, you! Now you're not the only one of us who can fly!**_

A large sweat-drop made its way down the back of Naruto's blonde head as he slid on his pair of clean, orange boxers and began to get dressed for the day while deciding against reminding Kurama that it was _his_ body with the wings, not the biju's. As he finished sliding on his school uniform and threw his blazer over his shoulder, a delicious-smelling aroma made its way into his room and wafted into his nose.

"There you are," Rias greeted him from her place behind the electric stove his apartment came furnished with once he exited his bedroom. She was now – thankfully, or not, depending on how you thought about it – completely dressed in her Kuoh Academy uniform. "I hope you don't mind, but you were taking too long and your idea for pancakes _was_ a good one."

"It's…not a problem," he responded unsteadily, a little stunned to see this development. He then explained, "I was just doing a lot of thinking while I was in the shower."

"Can't say I blame you," the crimson-haired lady agreed with a small hum. "Want a few?" she asked while gesturing towards the stack of five perfectly golden-brown flapjacks.

"Uh…sure," he uncertainly answered with a shaky nod. _Well…_this_ certainly isn't what I expected to see,_ he thought as the azure-eyed girl set a pair of pancakes on a plate for him. "Uh, not to be rude or anything, but didn't you just say in the bed that you were my supposed master?"

"Not _supposed_, but I did say that," she confirmed with a nod as she set his plate – complete with a butter square and silverware – at one end of his six-person, rectangular dining table. Rias then took her own seat at the opposite end of the table that his plate was set at before gesturing to his offered plate and imploring, "Sit. Eat. I promise I didn't poison it, and here's the proof." She then took a bit of one of her own pancakes with an amused smile on her face directed his way.

"That's not what has me confused," he murmured while taking his seat opposite his apparent, and confusing, master. "So… You're a devil," he started lamely as he began to slice his two flapjacks with his fork.

"I am," the young woman nodded as she raised another square of perfectly-done dough, "and so are you now. So what conclusions did your thinking come to?" she probed politely before placing her occupied utensil into her delicate mouth.

Naruto then started explaining to her about just what he and Kurama had concluded from everything they'd seen, discovered, and experienced. He was careful to leave out any mention of his inner tenant and his ability of chakra, but – judging from the appraising look his apparent 'master' was giving him – she seemed both pleased and impressed at his deductions.

"…and then I thought, 'Hey, maybe I've got wings too!' So I just focused a bit, and what do I know? Wings," Naruto finished as he shoved another square of pancake into his mouth. _This is _really _good!_

"For the most part, you are correct, Naruto-kun," Rias congratulated him before dabbing at her mouth with a napkin like a prim Lady. "Issei-kun died on his 'date' with that 'Yuuma,' who was, indeed a Fallen Angel in disguise. I must admit to being curious though: How were you unaffected by 'Yuuma's' spell for everyone to forget her?"

_**She's rather observant,**_ Kurama commented.

_Yeah, she is,_ he agreed. "I'm…_different_ than most people," Naruto offered. "To be completely honest, I've never really dealt with legitimate _magic_ before, so I'm not entirely certain how I was immune to her spell."

"Immune?" she picked up his slip with a curious look on her face.

_Shit._ "I…_felt_ the spell be cast, but it didn't affect me."

"Why not?"

"Not so fast," the blonde told her with a vulpine smirk stretching his face. "I think that it's my turn to ask a few questions, Rias-chan."

"I suppose," the devil-woman conceded with a small downturn of her lips. "Ask away."

_**She knows you're deliberately avoiding answering anything about your potential abilities, Naruto, **_the biju commented to him. _**I doubt this topic is truly done.**_

_I do as well,_ he agreed silently. "So you're mine and Issei's…_master_, is that right?" Her nod was all the answer he needed before asking her, "So then why did I wake up with you in my bed, naked, if we didn't do the deed?"

"To heal you, of course," Rias answered immediately. "Light particles from weapons of Light – like that Fallen Angel's spear last night – are a devil's greatest weakness and even a small slash can cause great harm if not treated. One of my other servants noticed that there was a 'funny feeling' coming from your wound. Naturally, a few of us thought that it was leftover Light particles in your bloodstream from when you'd been stabbed earlier. The best healing spell I know is one where I have to directly insert my Devil's Aura into you in order to sufficiently heal any and all wounds."

"And you were naked because…?" he prompted further explanation.

The young woman's azure eyes rolled as she explained, "The spell requires direct, skin-to-skin contact in order for it to work. I was admittedly tired after reincarnating you into a devil, so I wanted to finish healing you as fast as possible – which oddly didn't take nearly as long as I thought it would. The more skin contact, the more efficient the healing."

"So we were both in our birthday suits because you were _healing_ me?" he concluded with a skeptical eye sent her way.

"Yes," she told him with a direct stare.

Naruto held the direct eye contact for a few moments before shrugging his shoulders and saying, "Eh, works for me. Now, if you don't mind me asking, why didn't you intervene last night until _after_ I'd gotten stabbed?"

Rias gave him a crooked smirk in response, like she'd been expecting him to ask her that, before telling him, "Why, I do believe it is time we begin making our way to school, Naruto-kun. We don't want to be late for First Period, now do we?"

_She's giving it right back to me,_ the shinobi realized quickly with a small frown tugging at his lips. _Fine. I'll see how this thing goes for a little while before I decide if I want to stay on with her as her 'servant' or leave and go on my own way. This world is pretty big, after all._ "Very well," he conceded verbally with a small inclination of the head. He then stood from his chair and finished, "We wouldn't want to be late for school, after all."

* * *

"Well, here we are," Naruto extended his arm to his 'master' as the pair came within sight of Kuoh Academy.

A delicate, crimson eyebrow rose at his action and Rias then asked him, "And just what might that be for?"

"Well," the blonde began to explain, "the fact that I am about to be seen walking onto campus with one of the 'Two Great Onee-sama' of Kuoh Academy might be it. The rumor mill will, of course, go insane and blow this out of the water, so I say we act the part just this once and _really_ screw with the gossips."

A few delighted chuckles escaped from the crimson-haired beauty's throat at hearing his latest idea for a prank. "Okay," she agreed before she wrapped one of her arms in his offered one, "but only just this once to mess with everyone. No lying about what didn't happen last night. I will make it my first official order if I must."

"I would _never_ lie about taking a maiden's chastity," Naruto assured her in an overly-dramatic, gentlemanly fashion. "I doubt even Issei would ever sink that low, and if he would then I must beat it out of him."

"Disciplining the servant's behavior is the _master's_ job, Naruto-kun," she reminded him with a small, pleased smile.

"Then count it as a dispute between friends if you must," he insisted.

Before Rias could return fire and continue their playful back-and-forth banter, the two both heard from behind them, "Ara, ara. Aren't you two getting along just fine, Buchou."

The two with the linked arms turned together and witnessed a slightly-panicked Issei following a pleased Akeno Himejima. _What in the…_ Naruto wondered before it clicked in his head. _She must be the last presence you picked up, Kurama._

_**She is,**_ Kurama confirmed for him.

"Akeno," Rias greeted her fellow female with a small inclination of the head. She then turned and spoke directly to Issei, "Good morning to you, Issei-kun."

Issei's frantic golden eyes shot upwards and he quickly looked around, like he was afraid something might come out and bite him or something. When he finally realized just who had greeted him though, the brown-haired boy managed to calm himself down before returning the greeting with an uneasy, forced formal tone, "Oh, uh, good morning, Gremory-sama. How are you on this fine day?"

"I am fine," she answered him while Naruto couldn't help but suppress a few snickers at how uncomfortable Issei looked right then. The master then turned towards the Yamato Nadeshiko with a raised eyebrow while she assured Issei, "You don't need to be so formal when we're amongst ourselves, Issei, only when we're dealing with a differing Devil Family who directly addresses you. In all other occurrences, it is perfectly okay for you to refer to me as 'Buchou' since you and Naruto-kun will now be joining the Occult Research Club."

"T-Thanks, Buchou," Issei expressed with a nervous glance sent Akeno's way that Naruto didn't miss.

"Akeno, this is Naruto Uzumaki," Rias then introduced the blonde to her. "Naruto-kun, this is Akeno Himejima, my most trusted friend and your fellow servant."

"Nice to meet you, Akeno-san," Naruto offered his greetings first with a respectful inclination of the head. He could already tell that the raven-haired teenage woman had extraordinary power within her just from her aura, though it was an odd mix.

"Nice to meet you too, Uzumaki-kun," the Japanese beauty returned with a traditional bow from the hips like a Shrine-Miko would. "I look forward to _instructing_ both you and little Issei-kun," she finished, causing Issei to briefly flinch and making Naruto really curious as to why.

"Shall we then?" the blonde asked the two graceful ladies. "Rias-chan and I have decided to light the fire of the rumor mill and toss a little gas on it. Would the two of you like to join us?" he requested of the other devils.

"….Chan?" Issei caught onto how Naruto was speaking of the 'master,' causing him to stop and adopt an inquisitive look sent the shinobi's way.

"Ara, ara," Akeno giggled primly. "How bold of you, Uzumaki-kun, but I'm certain young Issei-kun wouldn't mind at all if we joined in on your fun."

"Huh?" the unaware boy blinked dumbly at them all until Akeno suddenly latched herself onto the perverted boy's left arm, making him let out a high-pitched, girlish scream that caused both Naruto and Rias to briefly lose control of their snickers and openly laugh at the shock present on his face. "Ak-Akeno-senpai!?" he exclaimed in shock.

"Shh," the ponytail-wielding teenaged beauty shushed him by putting a delicate forefinger over his lips and bringing her face close to his, making the youngest male there whimper briefly. Issei stilled and she whispered into his ear just barely loud enough for Naruto to overhear due to his heightened senses, "Just let it happen, Issei-kun. Just stop resisting and let your senpai have her way."

_**That girl sounds like she's about to rape your friend,**_ Kurama pointed out with a chuckle.

_Nah. She's probably harmless, Kurama. Besides, it's not really, technically rape if you actually like it, _he quipped to the biju's words, _and I highly doubt Issei wouldn't enjoy a single moment of it._

"H-Hai, Akeno-senpai," the poor boy relented with a resigned sigh.

The dark-haired beauty then raised her unoccupied hand and affectionately patted Issei's cheek while complimenting him, "Good boy, Issei-kun. Your Akeno-senpai will always take care of her cute little kouhai."

"Just what did she do to him?" the whiskered blonde whispered to his own partner.

"I don't know," Rias answered him in a low voice so as to not be overheard while the group of four devils made their way to Kuoh in their pairs. "I only told her to make sure she explained just what happened last night and how he's now a devil, like her. Maybe I should've specified there was to be no training…"

"Don't worry about it," Naruto dismissed her concerns with a lazy wave of his hand, oblivious of the many people now staring at him and the girl on his arm with slacked jaws as they passed the Kuoh front gate. "All he'll need is a good peeping and Issei'll be back to normal before the end of the school day."

"I'll have to trust your judgment on that," his 'master' told him. "A few of my other servants had told me about how much of a pervert he is, but can it overcome even a _morning's_ worth of Akeno?"

"Without a doubt," he snorted at the notion. _Hell, Ero-sennin would get the tar beat out of him, but be back to normal faster than I could blink if another hot babe happened to be in the Hot Springs. _"Issei's a stubborn guy, Rias-chan," unknown to the pair, numerous people had just let out gasps at hearing how he'd just spoken to her. "And I do mean _stubborn_. Never underestimate the power of the super-pervert's perversion, or you'll end up surprised beyond belief."

"You don't know Akeno, though," she pointed out.

"And _you_ don't know Issei," he returned with a wry grin sent her way.

"Fair point," Rias conceded with a small nod. She then looked around and noticed that they'd since passed through the schools front entrance and now stood in front of the main staircase. "Well, this has been fun, Naruto-kun, but I believe this is where we must part ways. We do have differing classes, after all."

"What? No kiss?" he asked with a teasing grin. He then turned around only to see Akeno plant a small kiss on Issei's cheek, making the poor boy go stiff as a board and his face grow a rather dopey-looking grin. "See, even Issei gets one. What do I get from my _master _as proof she adores her cute little servants?"

The crimson-haired beauty grinned up at him before leaning up and whispering in his ear, "You got to see me naked, Naruto-kun, and so long as I don't hear about it, I can't discipline you for telling people about it."

"That seems like a fair deal," the blonde agreed while quickly raising his free hand and pinching his nose shut in order to prevent a nosebleed from running. "But will it happen again anytime soon?"

The smirk that went across the devilish woman's face sent shivers down his back as she huskily whispered into his ear, "As often and as many times as I need to." Rias then separated herself from the blonde and began to make her way up the stairs, making the shinobi blush as he watched on, entranced, as her hips swayed from side to side. She then called back over her shoulder with that stupid smirk still on her face, "Someone will come to collect both you and Issei-kun after school is over for you both to meet your fellow Club Members. I'll see you later, Naruto-kun," she teased before blowing him a kiss and continuing on her way up to the third floor for her classes.

_My God, she's playing me,_ the whiskered blonde thought in realization. _And the really scary thing is: I don't know if I can keep up with her,_ or_ if I even want her to stop. The last time I was defeated so badly was with Anko-sensei after the war, and she even decided to teach me the art afterwards! She even gave me her personal stamp of approval!_

_**This is even worse than that Mizugake when you went to Kiri for the Slug Woman, **_Kurama reminded him.

_Yeah, at least there I had the age-difference card to play to stop _that_ before anything could happen, but Rias and I are practically the same age!_

_**Don't look to me for guidance,**_the fox cut in before anything could happen. _**You humans' mating rituals never made much sense to me even when your mother was my jinchuuriki.**_

_I'm a devil now,_ Naruto reminded him with a grin. _Not really a human anymore._ He then pulled out a Number-Two pencil from his bag and tried twirling it in his fingers while beginning to make his way to his first class, only for it to shatter into a thousand little shards of graphite and wood the instant he used any more than the absolute minimum force in his finger-squeeze. "Ouch," he grumbled out while shaking his steaming, healing hand.

"Issei, YOU SHIT!"

"HOW COULD YOU!?"

"Now what's going on here?" the blonde wondered to himself as he walked around a corner, only to find that both Matsuda and Motohama were ganging up on Issei while pounding their fists into his body. _Jealousy?_ he asked his inner voice in order to check if his semi-empathetic ability had been restored as well.

_**Not the only negative emotion present, but the major one,**_ Kurama corrected him. _** Around fifty-five percent jealousy, thirty percent anger, and fifteen percent pride.**_

_Pride?_ he mused in disbelief at the last one.

_**Pride of the Pervert?**_ the biju offered.

_Ero-sennin did say that existed…_

_**Naruto, look above you and thirty feet to your right,**_ the fox suddenly instructed.

Trusting his friend's judgment, Naruto followed the suggestion and did just so and his sharp cerulean gaze came to rest on a group of four upper-class women: Rias, Akeno, and two women who both wore glasses. _Isn't that…the Student Council President and Vice-President?_

_**I don't know,**_ Kurama answered him, _**but they're both definitely devils like those other two up there. Not quite as powerful individually, but above the low Jounin in equal strength judging from their auras.**_

_You're right,_ the blonde agreed while narrowing his eyes at the shorter of the glasses-wearing young women. _Hadn't been able to pinpoint it, but the President is definitely the most powerful of the Student Council 'Devils.' I suppose that means that the 'Student Council' is really just a front and all the members are just her servants. That settles it, now I'm certain the polls are rigged, and I'm voting against all incumbents next year!_

Kurama rolled his eyes at Naruto's words before saying, _**Not what I care about right now, nor ever really will. Can you tell what the smallest of them is doing?**_

_She's…looking at me,_ Naruto noticed. His eyes then narrowed and he witnessed the Kaichou doing the same to him. _She's looking at me like she's trying to take me apart with her mind and find ways to 'deal' with me. Damn it! I thought I was done with all these frickin' geniuses! I hope you're happy back there, Shikamaru, because I just found your damned opposite here!_

* * *

**A/N:** Here's Chapter 2, y'all, hope you like. Unfortunately, I likely won't be able to update any of my stories for a few weeks starting next Saturday since I'm going on vacation.

But, in positive news, I'm going to try and get a few updates out next week before I go out on my family vacation.

Also, HOLY SHIT, NEARLY TWO-HUNDRED-FIFTY FAVORITES, OVER FORTY-FIVE REVIEWS IN ONLY THE FIRST CHAPTER! I've NEVER had such a huge positive reaction to any of my stories before. I'm also going to take that as a sign that you people did somewhat enjoy my start.

To assuage a few people's admittedly understandable fears: I promise you that my story is quite original in its eventual direction. Believe me when I say that I've read the majority of Naruto-DxD crossovers in order to verify that my idea WAS original in my plans. I'm not revealing anything about my eventual plot, but I can swear on my life that my story is my own and you won't find one like it.

P.S. I apologize for any false leads from earlier, the document I uploaded for this chapter wasn't actually the right one.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

* * *

"So," the crimson-haired devil-woman finished, "do either of you two have any questions about what I just explained?"

"So, in short," Naruto summarized, "me and Issei are now legit Devils fighting in a war against two races with both enemies having the ability to wipe our existence off the map, one of those two factions is also a battle for control over the Underworld, Yuuma really existed and _wasn't _a figment of this idiot's imagination, Issei was killed because of this 'Sacred Gear' thing, everyone here is a devil and – aside from the two of us – has been for quite some time, and if we two newbs work at it we could one day get our very own lackeys to boss around. Anything I miss?"

"Not that I can think about," Rias answered the whiskered blonde while Issei stared at him in disbelief at how simple he'd just made the last two hours' worth of conversation seem. "That's actually an acute summarization, Naruto-kun."

"Aw, shucks. It was nothing," Naruto told her with a lazy swipe of one of his hands while he stealthily snuck his other towards the plate of food on his left. "I was never really one for all those dramatic details anyway. Good to keep it short and sweet in my mind."

"Mine," was all the warning he received before his sneaking hand was suddenly crushed by the small fist of Koneko, making him jump out of his seat and let out a yelp in pain before blowing on his now-red and pulsing appendage.

"You didn't need to crush my hand, but message received loud and clear, Koneko-chan," the former shinobi directed towards the stoic girl while he shook his hand and everyone – minus a shocked Issei – let out simultaneous chuckles at his new discovery. _Note to self: Don't _ever_ try and steal food from Koneko-chan,_ he promised himself. _Good gracious that felt like my hand got stomped on by one of your paws, Kurama!_

_**The chibi is stronger than she appears,**_ Kurama informed him well after the fact had been found out through experience.

_Geez, I hadn't noticed that,_ he responded sarcastically.

"Well, since introductions are done and over with," Rias called attention back to her and away from the faint red glow emanating from Naruto's formerly crushed hand, "I think I can tell you both about what your first duty as a devil will be tonight." The crimson-haired beauty then snapped her fingers and what had been explained to the blonde as a Magic Circle appeared over her desk and out of it came a pair of sacks that landed with an audible 'thud' on her oaken desk.

"Oh, _hell_ no!" Naruto shouted in dismay before ducking behind the sofa he, Issei, and Koneko were all sitting on so fast that nobody even had the opportunity to see him move. "There's _no way_ I'm doing _paperwork_! I'd rather just walk out and take my chances with those Angels and Fallen Angels than have to sign _one_ document!" _I thought I was done with that stuff when I got here!_ he mentally howled while he curled up in a ball and began to cry anime tears down his cheeks.

Issei's worried eyes peered over the back of the green sofa and he asked concernedly, "Yo, Naruto, you okay there, buddy? You look like you've just seen a ghost."

Naruto mumbled on incoherently and didn't pay any attention to his friend's concerned words. "Carpel-tunnel. Sign. _Paperwork!_ Bane of Kage's existence!"

**_No!_** Kurama screamed within his mind. **_No more papers!_**

"…Flashbacks?" Koneko offered with a few blinks of confusion.

"Of what?" Kiba wondered aloud while scratching the back of his head.

"Ara, ara," Akeno watched on with a decidedly amused grin on her face that briefly made Naruto picture a certain violet-haired Snake Mistress of Konoha.

"I've never seen him like this," Issei informed everyone while the whiskered blonde continued to speak in gibberish on the floor behind the couch.

"Well, I do believe that we have discovered Naruto's greatest weakness," Rias spoke to all present members of the Occult Research Club with noticeable mirth dancing behind her eyes. "We must make sure the Angels and the Fallen Angels never find out that the easiest way to defeat Naruto is to pull out a stack of papers.

"However," she then directed towards the blonde currently cradling himself on the ground, "I can promise you, Naruto, that these papers aren't _paperwork_, as you so put it. These are the Gremory Summoning Magic Circles I told you about earlier. All you need to do is hand them out. You don't need to _sign _them," she finished with a decidedly taunting smirk sent his way.

"Okay, then," Naruto responded immediately and was suddenly standing next to the azure-eyed beauty all the way across the room. Everyone stared back and forth from where he'd just been on the floor and where he now stood – at least a good solid fifteen feet away – with flummoxed expressions as he asked for clarification, "No signing?"

"No signing and filing for you, Naruto-kun," Rias assured him with an amused smirk twitching at her cheeks.

"Oh, thank God," the shinobi breathed out in relief, only for another splitting headache to make itself known to him. "Ow! What the hell!? Where are all these headaches coming from!?"

"Probably because you gave God your gratitude, like how a follower of Christianity would," the woman next to him informed him with a matter-of-fact tone and look. "Any action that might even be considered as a devil following the ways of God results in quite a bit of pain."

"Fucking hell," Naruto groaned while rubbing his temples and the stabbing pain began to gradually flee his cranium.

"So, Buchou," Issei's nervous voice then cut in, "what were you saying about me having this 'Sacred Gear' thingy?"

"Ah, yes," she answered the boy's call. She turned her head towards the green sofa and repeated, "As I said earlier, it was why you were targeted by the Fallen Angels in the first place, Issei, and last night I confirmed with my own eyes that you do possess a Sacred Gear."

"When did _that_ happen?" the blue-eyed jinchuuriki wondered aloud as he picked up a stack of leaflets and his eyes gazed over the design of the Magic Circle inscribed on it. _It looks kinda' like fuuinjutsu, yet entirely different at the same time, _he noted.

"After you were stabbed, Naruto-kun," Rias replied with a steady voice, causing the blonde in question to stop what he was doing and begin paying _avid_ attention to what was about to be revealed. "After that occurred, Issei was thrown into a state of emotional turmoil that caused his innate power to awaken for the first time last night. Issei," she then instructed, "I want you to tell all of us what was going through your mind after Naruto was stabbed."

Issei grimaced at how bland the beauty was speaking of the previous evening's experience, but he stood up steadily and told them all after taking a moment to compose himself, "I…was pretty sad at first, but then all I could feel was…_hate_ – rage – at that man last night. All I wanted to do was rip his wings off his back and stuff them down his throat for what he did to you, Naruto. Then I suddenly felt…_powerful_ – like I could not only do that, but then go and find Yuuma and do the same to her."

Naruto's cerulean orbs locked with his friend's amber irises and silently communicated his gratitude for his friend's thoughts while Rias nodded in acknowledgement of the brown-haired boy's words. "Good," she complimented. "Now, what I want you to do is focus your energy in your left arm and then call all your power forth in one effort, Issei. Can you do that for me?"

"H-Hai, Buchou," Issei responded immediately while snapping his arms and legs straight to his sides like how an untrained soldier would. He then closed his eyes tight and his face scrunched up in concentration as he followed their master's instructions.

"You're doing it all wrong Issei," Naruto informed him in a calm voice that cut through the budding tension in the room. "Don't _force_ it out, _guide_ it – work _with_ it. What you're doing right now just makes you look constipated in front of everyone."

Issei's cheeks burned red while everyone else turned and stared at the shinobi with shock apparent on each of their faces. "Uh…sure, Naruto," the gold-eyed youth returned with his cheeks still tinged cherry from embarrassment.

"What?" the shinobi asked everyone staring at him. "Why is it everyone always assumes that I'm an idiot?" he voiced rhetorically.

_**Because you are,**_ the inner biju piped up.

_Oh, shut it, you._

"What he said is true, Issei-kun," the raven-haired young beauty managed to speak first as she looked towards the boy attempting to reawaken his power. "It's a fundamental lesson in harnessing your abilities as a Devil. Don't _force_ the energy out, but instead show it to where you want it to go. It might be difficult at first, but it gets easier the more you use it."

"Y-Yeah," Issei answered her with an appreciative nod for her advice. He then closed his eyes once more, but this time his facial features remained somewhat lax and loose instead of strained and forced. After a few moments of tense silence of apprehension, his golden eyes shot open with a fierce determination within them while he thrust his left arm into the air and called out confidently, "Sacred Gear!"

A small, pleased grin wormed its way onto Naruto's face as he felt a small surge of power come from his friend's now-glowing left hand. A red gauntlet then formed over Issei's wrist and hand and then extended down his forearm while a large green jewel glowed brightly over the dorsal side of the boy's hand covered by the gauntlet.

_Not too big, but that thing's got quite the potent aura,_ Naruto noticed silently as the glow died down and Issei blankly stared at his Sacred Gear in disbelief.

_**Indeed it does,**_Kurama agreed. _**The aura is also completely different from his Devil's Aura. Actually, I believe that it's beginning to pour into his aura and the two are mixing together.**_

_Interesting,_ the blue-eyed former shinobi studied the aura shift through his semi-sixth-sense. _He could even give _me _a run for my money if he's trained right…_

"That," Rias' voice broke Naruto away from his ponderings, "is your Sacred Gear, Issei."

"Woah," the brown-haired teen breathed out in wonder as he reached out and ran his uncovered hand over the gauntlet's spiky length. "I feel…_awesome!_ So what does it do? Does it turn me into some giant, unstoppable monster?"

"Not quite," the devilish woman let out a chuckle in amusement. She then walked over and held her hand directly over the Sacred Gear's jewel, making it glow brightly again, and told Issei, "Each Sacred Gear is different. No two are alike. Isn't that right, Kiba?"

"Hai, Buchou," the other blonde devil responded with a knightly bow. "Shall I offer a demonstration?"

Naruto's ears quickly perked up as he heard the opportunity for training present itself, but he deflated once Rias answered the other blonde, "Not tonight, Kiba. Some other time, perhaps, but not now. For now," she then walked back over to her desk, grabbed a stack of leaflets, and placed them in Naruto's hand. She sprouted a grin and finished, "Naruto-kun and Issei need to get started or else they won't even be able to get any sleep tonight."

"Damn it," the whiskered teen cursed under his breath. "I'd hoped all this Sacred Gear stuff would make you forget about that."

"Nice try, Naruto-kun, but you'll have to try _much_ harder to distract me," she informed him with a wry smile in place. "As it is your first official days as a devil, both you and Issei are currently the lowest of the low, and a good way for a Devil to work their way up the totem pole is through gaining summoning contracts. The more you get, the higher you go."

"And the less D-Ranks I'm stuck with," Naruto murmured under his breath.

"What was that, Naruto-kun?"

"Nothing you need to worry about, Rias-chan," he quickly dismissed her no-doubt curious string of questions at his words. The blonde then picked up one of the two thirty-pound bags of leaflets and tossed it at Issei. The sack of papers collided with the boy's chest and he let out an 'oomph' while he caught it and Naruto instructed while hefting his own bag over his shoulder as easily as he would a sack of feathers, "Come on, Issei, let's just get this thing done. Also, put away your Sacred Gear, all it'll do is attract unwanted attention."

* * *

Naruto took in a deep breath as he sat atop his apartment building in a meditative pose. He remained still as a breeze blew across his face and rustled his Kuoh uniform around his body while the mid-day sun beamed down upon his tanned face.

"Ugh, it's no _use_!" the blonde suddenly screamed at the sky in frustration. "No matter what I do, I can't get _any_ Natural Energy into my Magic Container! At this rate I'll end up stuck like Issei!"

_**At least a few of your 'clients' don't seem to mind it,**_ Kurama reminded him.

"Yeah," he responded verbally since there was nobody close enough to overhear him, and even if someone _had_ managed to sneak up on him – no matter how unlikely that would be – all he needed to say was that he was talking to himself. "I gotta admit though, this whole 'Being a Devil' thing hasn't been _anything_ like I thought it'd be."

_**Indeed,**_ the voice inside his head agreed. _**You weren't wrong about doing D-Ranks again, though.**_

The blonde let out a few unintelligible mumbles before responding, "Yeah, but at least this time I'm actually getting to know the clients. I've even got Ryuko-chan's number so she can summon me without bothering with the Summoning Circle."

_**You know – **_

"Yes!" Naruto interrupted in a yelp as he felt heat rush to his cheeks. "I'm well-aware of how good Ryuko-chan looks despite the face she's in her forties and has two kids close to my age. And _no_ I will _not_ think those thoughts, Kurama!"

_**It was just a thought…**_ the biju stated.

The shinobi let out a snort as he told the fox, "Yeah, and a bad one at that. I swear that Ero-Sennin got you, too, Kurama."

…_**I think he did, **_he admitted. _**Curse you, you perverse Sannin!**_

A sweatdrop trailed down Naruto's neck as he decided not to continue down that avenue of conversation. He then stood up from the concrete and stretched his arms over his head as he thought out loud, "Well, there's no school today, so Rias-chan can't get on my case like she did yesterday. I suppose it's finally time to get reacquainted with my bad-assery. Don't you agree, Kurama?"

The gigantic fox within offered no reply before the blonde began to go through the kata for some of his Toad Style taijutsu with gusto within his every movement. For a period of over thirty minutes the only sounds atop the nearly-abandoned building were the shinobi's grunts as he attempted to grow accustomed to his new physical prowess and his limbs slashing through the air with a precision Naruto was anything but pleased by.

"God _damn_ it!" he screamed in his disgruntlement. "No matter how much I try and hold back, I can't fix this fast enough! If I were to fight Kakashi-sensei right now he'd wipe the floor with me," he grumbled in a dissatisfied huff.

_**Calm down, Naruto,**_Kurama instructed him from within. _**You're simply being overly dramatic, and you **_**know**_** that the scarecrow wouldn't even be able to land a blow – you're simply too fast now.**_

_True, but I don't feel like I'm _flowing_ from one movement to the next like Ma and Pa taught me,_ the cerulean-eyed teen returned. _I feel like I'm forcing the movements. It's not _natural_, Kurama, and I'm supposed to be completely in tune with all my body's facets._

_**You just had a massive influx in power and a series of serious alterations done to your Chakra System,**_ the biju reminded him patiently. _**Relax, Naruto. You'll get it down soon enough. Right now, just keep at it until you feel things moving at a comfortable speed once more.**_

_What I really need is a sparring partner,_ the blonde youth realized with a small frown. _Only problem: There's nobody around I could practice with without risking me killing 'em._

_**So I guess it's on your own for now.**_

Naruto's blue eyes shot open as his friend's words sprouted an idea in his head that he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of yet. "Kurama, you're a _genius_! Why didn't I think of that already?"

_**Because you're an imbecile,**_ the fox answered his rhetorical.

"Hardy, har-har," the teenager replied with a deliberate drawl and roll of his eyes. "Ain't ever heard that one before."

_**Really?**_ Kurama shot back comfortably. _**Then you should really get that memory of yours checked, because I'm certain I tell you that at least twice a day.**_

_Sarcasm!_

_**I know,**_ the Kyuubi answered with a crooked smirk.

The blonde shinobi took in a deep breath to calm himself back down before throwing his hands together in a familiar hand-sign and he called out, "Tajuu Kage Bunshin no Jutsu (Multi Shadow Clone)!"

Immediately upon his usage of his signature technique, dozens of smoke clouds exploded into existence all around him and completely across the empty rooftop. The smoke puffs then dissipated into the air and unveiled over a full hundred solid, physical clones of the whiskered youth.

"Yosh!" Naruto exclaimed victoriously as he threw a fist into the air. "Thank you, Kakashi-sensei, for this: Shadow Clone training!"

"_YOSH_!" the entire mass of clones followed the original's lead.

"Alrighty then," the original mused after jumping atop one of the industrial-sized Air Conditioning units and started gazing down at his fellow blondes. "I want you all to pair up into twos. Half of ya' are gonna spar with me and the other half are –"

The blonde shinobi was cut off as a tremendous 'boom' came from within the ranks of clones. The first explosion was then linked together and multiple others immediately followed until every single clone Naruto had just made had completely dispelled in a blast.

The blue-eyed youth was left completely and utterly baffled at what he'd just witnessed occur. His eyes blinked in confusion at the now-barren rooftop while his jaw hung slack. He rubbed his eyes to check once more only for him to rediscover that what had just happened wasn't fantasy – it was reality.

"Wha– I mean– How– What the hell just happened!?" Naruto howled at the sky. "That's _never_ happened before – well, not unless I wanted them to, but still!? Kurama, do _you_ have any idea as to what just went wrong?"

_**I have one,**_ the biju answered him after a small moment spent in contemplation. _**But let's test my theory first before I tell you it. Just make a single Shadow Clone this time, Naruto.**_

"Okay," he acknowledged before focusing his chakra and creating only a single copy of himself this time. The clone waved at him and Naruto then asked his tenant, _Okay, now what?_

_**Now make another.**_

The blonde shrugged along with his clone before each of them created another clone – making four Narutos total. However, as soon as the new clones were made, Naruto immediately felt like something was off, even though each of the Shadow Clones all looked exactly alike.

Trusting his instincts honed through continuous battle, Naruto quickly jumped away from the group and hid behind another one of the Air Conditioning units along the rooftop. He then heard three shouts of confusion prior to a trio of small explosions go off exactly where he'd just left his group of Kage Bunshin and noted silently, _Those were about as large as a small explosive tag!_

_**I was right,**_ Kurama intoned after the shinobi had left his cover.

"So what's wrong, Kurama?" he queried as he inspected the three new, meter-wide black splotches on the roof.

_**Your chakra isn't stable enough for a Bunshin to maintain its physical form,**_ the biju began to explain. _**At least, that's my guess based on the brief glimpses your Shadow Clones got me into their forms.**_

"But if that's true," Naruto pointed out as he stood back up from his knee, "then why didn't they explode when I just made the first one? I didn't get the feeling they'd blow until we made more."

_**I'm not entirely certain,**_ the fox admitted from within. _**Make just a single clone this time, and then the two of you train separately until it dispels naturally or blows itself to pieces like the rest just did. That should give the piece of me inside it enough time to figure out just what the issue is.**_

Naruto shrugged once more before following his friend's instructions and created just a single Shadow Clone once more and relaying instructions for it to follow. The Clone then went off to practice chakra control exercises while the original continued in his attempt to grow accustomed to his new speed and strength.

The whiskered blonde was finally beginning to feel somewhat comfortable with his physical prowess when he felt two hours' worth of memories influx into his mind. He set those memories off to the side for the moment while he then went back to finishing his current set. He was able to finish the kata he was employing at the moment after a few more moments before he then sat down on the concrete with his legs crossed and began to sift through the clone's accumulated memories.

_Didn't make much headway with chakra control,_ Naruto noticed with a small downturn of his lips in his displeasure. _Although it looks like I made a few lumberjacks' jobs easier…_

_**Naruto, I think I know why there's an issue with your Bunshin limit.**_

_Then please let me know._

_**Okay,**_ Kurama explained._** First off now – for some reason – your clones are somewhat more durable.**_

_I noticed,_ he replied dryly. _Usually they dispel when a tree falls on top of them, but that one didn't._

_**But what you didn't piece together was why,**_ the biju pointed out. _**From what I could tell, something about your chakra has been altered fundamentally. I'm hypothesizing that your chakra is simply now so potent that your Kage Bunshin have actually gained the ability to take a punch without dying. And if that's true, then your Clones have become a much more useful tool.**_

"That's great, Kurama, but why do they blow up?"

_**I'm getting to that, Naruto. Your chakra's potency – it seems – has become a double-edged sword when come to your clones – as well as the rest of all your chakra-based techniques I'll bet. Because of how you create your clones – you just pour chakra into them without controlling how much when you make them – your clones can only remain stable up to a certain point, and any more than one clone is that point for now.**_

"So I can't make any more than one at a time, is that right?" Naruto asked his inner buddy.

_**Not unless you want to blow yourself to bits,**_ the mountainous fox quipped. _**I'm fairly certain you could eventually regain your army of clones, which would be a truly deadly fighting force now, but first you'd need to master your new chakra.**_

"That's gonna take _forever_!" the blonde groused. "So much for the _Kage no Kage Bunshin_! And I liked my title!"

_**Quit complaining,**_ Kurama chided his childishness for the umpteenth time. _**Besides, isn't it about time for you to meet with the rest of your little 'group.'**_

After briefly glancing upwards to see what the sun's current position was, he agreed, "Yeah. It's getting to be about that time again. Time to go hand out fliers again," he finished after standing up once more and dusting off his pants.

_**And then –**_

"_NO_!" Naruto shouted just a little too loud while his cheeks gained a faint cherry tint to them. "For the last time, you ero-kitsune, I'm _not_ going to sleep with someone old enough to be my mother!"

Kurama's incoherent, dissatisfied grumblings were lost on the jinchuuriki as he jumped off of his apartment complex's rooftop and began to make his way across town without falling to the street. As he got closer to Kuoh, he noticed Issei walking towards the Old School Building with his shoulders slumped and a ponderous look on his face.

_I wonder what's got Issei down,_ the cerulean-eyed friend wondered. _This is the first time I've seen him look like that since he discovered Mil-tan._ Naruto had to suppress a shudder as the memory of that gigantic_ thing_ surfaced through his thoughts.

_**I'm **_**still**_** not certain what that creature is,**_ the biju spoke up with a noticeable shiver. _**I'd rather deal with those spandex-clad clones back in Konoha. A**__**t least we had some understanding of those two.**_

Willing himself away from thoughts about disturbing creatures beyond human understanding, the blonde teen jumped down behind his friend without making a sound and suddenly greeted, "Hey there, Issei."

Not sensing the shinobi's approach at all made the brown-haired boy jump in surprise, but he quickly righted himself and replied, "Oh, uh, hey, Naruto."

"What's wrong, Issei?" the jinchuuriki probed gently. "You look like someone stole your porn."

"No, that's not it," Issei denied with a small shake of his head. "You see, I just met this girl…"

"Did you get her name?" Naruto queried with genuine curiosity reflecting in his eyes. "You wanna talk about it?"

"It's just… You remember what Buchou said last week about the Three Great Powers?"

"Enough to prove I somewhat listened," the blue-eyed teen answered him lazily. "To be honest, I don't really care about all that stuff at all. I grew up in war, Issei, and I know from experience that things are rarely as cut and dry as Rias-chan made them seem. I only really care about the people precious to me, and I don't care if they're a Devil, Fallen Angel, or Angel."

Issei's jaw clenched as he stated evenly, "I don't think I could be friends with a Fallen Angel, Naruto."

Naruto stared into his friend's golden eyes for a moment and realized that there would be no talking Issei away from his anger at the moment. He then shrugged and reminded him, "We're not here to discuss philosophy. You were about to tell me about this girl you met earlier," he quickly changed the subject in order to stymie Issei's rage before it could smolder any further.

The anger quickly evaporated and was replaced by a mixture of emotions on his face. The boy then looked down in shame and murmured, "I just know Buchou's gonna be mad."

"How come? I'm usually a good judge of character, and Rias-chan doesn't strike me as the vicious type. Overprotective, yes, but not really angry." _Though she did let me die last week…_

Issei's response was mumbled so low that not even Naruto's enhanced hearing could pick it up.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't quite hear that." He then requested, "Can you repeat that just a little louder?"

"…She told me she was a nun," the younger boy admitted in a low voice, but loud enough for his friend to hear. Issei's eyes then shot up and he continued with a worried slant, "I know Buchou said to avoid members of the Church, but she was so innocent and nice that I –"

"Calm down, Issei," the former apprentice of Jiraiya assured him with an understanding hint to his words. "You're probably right about Rias-chan, but as I said earlier: I don't really care about that stuff. She'll most-likely forbid you from ever having contact with the nun again."

"She will, won't she?" Issei deflated at hearing that.

"However, Rias-chan isn't perfect, Issei," the blonde spoke with a gentle, assuring tone. "Why don't you tell me about this girl? Was she nice?"

"The nicest person I've ever met," the brown-haired boy answered with a fond smile. "You'd have loved her, Naruto. She helped a complete stranger even though they couldn't talk with each other."

"I'm guessing that she's foreign then?" Naruto asked him as he took a seat at the base of one of the Kuoh trees. _Sorry, Rias-chan, but it looks like we're gonna be late tonight. I know those signs, and I'm not going to let you snuff this out. This girl is probably the first to _ever_ leave such an impression on Issei._

"She was," the younger youth nodded as he sat down next to his friend. "I think she said she was Italian, but I can't be sure. She had this beautiful, long blonde hair and the most amazing green eyes, Naruto. I mean, she wasn't as…_mature_ as Akeno-senpai or Buchou, but she was still a beautiful girl to me."

"You sound pretty smitten there, Issei," the whiskered youth pointed out with a teasing grin, making the gold-eyed boy blush bashfully. "Oh, relax, I'm just teasing. I'm actually proud of this, Issei. You never know, you meeting this nun could've been destiny. Tell me, what was this girl's name?"

Issei's eyes went up and he then answered him with affection bleeding into his words and eyes, "She told me that her name was Asia. Asia Argento."

* * *

"Naruto, can we talk?"

The former shinobi stopped where he was and looked back to where Rias was sitting behind her desk. "Sure," he nodded to her. He then turned his head and told Issei, "Go on ahead, Issei. I'll join you soon."

"Uh…okay," the younger teen replied uncertainly while he sent their master a furtive glance. "You sure you're gonna be okay though?"

"I'll be fine," the jinchuuriki assured him with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I've been yelled at plenty of times, and Rias-chan doesn't scare me anywhere _near_ as much as 'Baa-chan did."

"'Baa-chan?"

"I'll tell you about it some other time," Naruto quickly cut off that lane. "Now, go on and get started on getting yourself another contract."

"Oh, I never thanked you for helping me seal that contract the other day, did I?" Issei realized.

"It wasn't anything really," the whiskered youth answered him. "You were already basically doing what a contract entailed, you just didn't know how to finish it. Now you do."

"But I still owe you for showing me how."

"Then you can think about how you'll pay me back someday." The blue-eyed teen then reminded him, "Rias-chan wants to talk. I'll join you in a little bit."

The brown-haired boy hesitated a moment in the doorway before acquiescing with a reluctant nod. Issei then shut the door behind him, leaving his friend to face their master's ire alone.

"So what's this about?" Naruto asked politely as he fell down into one of the sofas and crossed his heels after propping them up on the small coffee table.

"You're encouraging Issei to continue seeing that nun," Rias accused in an even voice. "That is in direct opposition to my decision, Naruto."

"Is it? Well I guess so," he observed lazily while leaning his head back and watching the lone ceiling-fan spin itself around in a perpetual cycle. "Am I not allowed to have my own opinions?"

"Some master's would've flayed you alive for your insubordination, Naruto," she spoke icily.

"Is that your intention then, Gremory-_sama_?" he retorted with a veiled threat and an arched eyebrow sent her way. "Because if it is, I suppose I should warn you that you wouldn't be the first."

Rias' face grimaced slightly at his tone, but her eyes never wavered in their glare sent at him. "I encourage my servants to think for themselves, Naruto," she answered steadily. "But what I will _not_ tolerate is someone placing _any_ member of my House into potential danger."

"Is that what this is about then? You _actually_ think I'd intentionally put someone _I_ care about in harm's way?" He shook his head in disappointment and told her, "The _only_ rule I believe in is this, Rias-chan: A person is only truly strong when they have someone precious to them."

"If Issei is so precious to you, then why place him directly in the sights of the same Fallen Angels who've already harmed him once?" the master returned fire. "_All_ that nun would bring Issei is trouble, Naruto-kun. You haven't been a part of this world long, so don't presume to know everything about how this world works."

"That's true," he conceded with a slight nod. _In more ways than you think,_ he silently added to himself. "However, I was _raised_ in war, Rias-chan, and I have no desire to see this world be torn apart like mine nearly was. I _know_ war, and I also know that there's both good and evil on each side in _every_ war ever fought. So _don't_ presume to know about me," he finished with his blue eyes sharp.

"Is that why you deliberately challenge my authority then? Because you think I don't know war?"

"You _don't_," the shinobi stated emphatically while maintaining his even volume, making her azure eyes widen a fraction at the conviction in his words. "I don't _think_, I _know_ you don't know war. There are no winners or losers in war, Rias-chan – there are only survivors and the dead. If you'd even held a _slight_ understanding of the atrocities of war, then you'd understand what I believe this Asia could represent.

"I've seen true war, Rias-chan – _total_ war. I've watched people I grew up with – people who'd raised me – die. I've seen and felt true betrayal by the only person I thought who understood me. I was helpless to save the woman I loved more than anything as she bled out in my arms after my former best friend shoved his fist through her chest.

"_That_ is war, Rias. War is nothing but despair and hatred. My godfather passed on to me his mission in life, and I now have the chance to succeed again. I _will not_ back down in this, Rias-chan." He then stood up stiffly as the stunned crimson-haired girl just stared at him in shock. "Now, if that's all, I should get back to handing out fliers."

As he turned and made his way towards the Occult Research Club's doorway, he heard, "Stop!"

The blonde slowly turned his unreadable face and his fiery eyes showed him that his 'master' had stood from her desk. "Is that an order?" he asked tersely.

"No," she denied with a shake of her head. "A request." The azure-eyed beauty took in a deep breath and admitted to him, "You're right. I haven't been in war before. My elder brother was, however, and whenever he talks about either of them his eyes looked like yours: Sadder than I can even understand.

"I want you to know, Naruto-kun, that I have nothing against the nun. My worry is that the Fallen Angels will use her to hurt Issei since he's too trusting. He would rush headfirst into a situation without thinking at all, and that might wind up putting him in a trap I can't help him out of. I don't want what little trust we have between us to be destroyed over this."

"Trust?" he nearly snorted out loud at her words. "What _trust_? You're secretive and manipulative, Rias-chan. Even I can tell that much just from judging on the night you 'saved' me and turned me into a Devil."

Rias recoiled from his words as if he'd struck her. Her azure eyes were wide and she tried, "I swear I –"

"You let me die," the former Kage-apparent reminded her slowly. Naruto turned fully around and stared her down as he continued on as he slowly walked towards her menacingly, "You _watched_ me die, Rias. Don't bother denying it because I felt your presence there that night. The _only_ reason I haven't just walked off and left you all by now is Issei. He's naïve and foolish, and I _refuse_ to let you manipulate him."

"I swear that was _never my _intention!" Rias swore to him vehemently. "I would never, _ever_ manipulate someone I care about!"

"And you expect me to believe that you honestly care about Issei?"

"Yes," the devil-woman answered steadily while refusing to tear her gaze from his own, and Naruto felt no deception coming from her at all. "And not only Issei, either. _You're _someone I care about, Naruto-kun."

"Where I come from, you don't stand by and let someone you care about take a spear to the gut," the blonde told her absent any humor in his voice.

The young beauty took in another deep breath to calm herself before she met his cerulean eyes directly once more and requested, "Please allow me a chance to explain, Naruto-kun. That's all I ask of you now. You don't need to stay, but if you do I promise I'll answer any questions you have."

"And why should I believe you won't simply lie to me?"

"Because I honestly want us to trust each other," she responded with a soft gaze that took the shinobi by surprise. The two of them held their direct stare for a few tense moments of utter silence.

_**Naruto,**_ Kurama spoke in,_** she's telling the truth. Completely. She honestly will answer your questions and truly desires there to be some trust between you both.**_

_Are you positive?_

_**I'm certain of it.**_

Naruto continued to stare directly into his master's gentle azure gaze until he relented with a slight nod. "Fine," he conceded to her. "Explain then why you didn't intervene until I'd been stabbed and died." The two of them both then took their respective seats with each on one sofa facing the other.

"You never actually died," Rias told him, "but you _were _close when we moved. To start, I never intervened because it didn't look like you needed any help – you seemed to have the matter well-in-hand when we arrived. It was obvious to me that you were simply leading that Fallen Angel around and had a plan to defeat him. In truth, I had intended on approaching you once you and Issei had left the Fallen Angel's barrier in order to explain what had occurred and to offer you a position within my House, Naruto-kun.

"However, you ended up stabbed before I could move after that man played possum." The beauty took in one more deep inhale before continuing, "You called me both secretive and manipulative. I won't deny that I am both, but I never manipulate members of my House unless it is to benefit them, not me. I do have my secrets that I keep from you, but that is for the same reason you keep yours: I simply don't trust you enough yet to reveal all my personal secrets. I do, however, trust Akeno above all to the point she is aware of everything I both plan and keep hidden. It is simply a matter of time before I share my secrets and you yours.

"As I was trained by my father, mother, and sister-in-law, I am practical above all else, Naruto – sometimes to the point of cold logic and reasoning. You were stabbed before I could order any action to save you, so I didn't bother thinking about intervening then because it is a well-known fact that Sacred Gears respond to the emotions of their user. I knew that you being so grievously wounded while protecting Issei would drive him over the edge and at the very least awaken his power."

"What is Issei's Sacred Gear?" Naruto cut her off from going any further. While he was admittedly a tad bit miffed by her cold logic, he couldn't fault her for being practical – Tsunade had told him that a leader had to be at times. "You made it seem that you already knew what it was, even though you didn't explain anything to him at all."

"If I'm right," Rias explained, "then Issei is the current wielder of the Sekiryuutei, or the Red Dragon Emperor. It is one of the thirteen Sacred Gears classified as a Longinus – which means it has the potential to slay even a God." Naruto's eyes widened at the implications of her words while she kept going, "The Boosted Gear – which is the official name of the Sacred Gear – is said to double its user's strength every ten seconds."

The blue-eyed youth leaned back into the sofa as he let all that information wash over him. "If that's true, then Issei…" he trailed off. _Issei could very well end up _stronger _than me,_ he realized.

_**That's a sobering thought,**_ Kurama intoned.

Naruto then looked up and let his curiosity show, "Why tell me that?"

"Because I promised to tell you the truth," Rias reminded him with nothing but honesty present in her sky-blue orbs. "I do have to ask that you don't share this knowledge with Issei just yet, as this knowledge wouldn't do him any good as he is now."

"Knowledge is sometimes more burden than blessing," the shinobi recited something the Sandaime had told him after the Mizuki Incident of over half-a-decade ago to him. "I have to agree," he then accepted Rias' decision. "Knowing how powerful he _could_ be wouldn't help Issei as he is right now. He'd need to experience his limits and _want_ to go further."

"I'm glad we agree on this, Naruto-kun," the crimson-haired young woman smiled at him accompanied with a respectful inclination of the head. "As you can guess, Issei's Sacred Gear becoming known at the moment won't help him. What I want is to help him become as powerful as he can become, but I'm currently unsure how to go about doing it."

"You said that Sacred Gears respond to the emotions of their users, correct?" Rias' nod was all the answer required before Naruto continued, "And would affection be counted as a powerful emotion?"

"Love is known to be the strongest," she admitted to him.

"Then for now why don't you just let the situation play out between the nun and Issei naturally. Don't try to control it or nip it in the bud. Allow this to run its course."

"That places Issei in serious danger, Naruto-kun," the young woman reminded him with a sharp edge to her gaze.

"You can't hope for him to grow strong with you guiding him by the hand, Rias-chan," he berated her inexperience in this avenue. "I'm more than capable of keeping Issei safe should everything become F.U.B.A.R."

"Fubar?" she blinked at the new term.

"Fucked up beyond all repair," he answered her with a wry grin, and she accepted his information. "My old sensei told me about that, but back to what I was saying. I know how to get Issei stronger, and keeping him from this Asia girl will only make him want to go to her more."

"Just what are you proposing, Naruto-kun?" she queried with an arched eyebrow in her curiosity.

"Keep on playing the bad guy," he requested of her. "If anybody knows how to motivate Issei, it's me."

"Very well," Rias acknowledged. "Tell me then, do we at least have a little trust now?"

"A small amount," he answered, "but should this work the way I want it to, then trust won't be our biggest issue anymore."

* * *

**A/N:** Heeeeeeeere's dripley11! (I hope all of you caught that reference, if not, research the quote, "Here's Johnny!")

I am back, vacation was awesome. Enjoyed the days of peace I had, and I also got a little writing done, believe it or not. I'd actually finished this chapter on vacation, but we had no computers for me to use out there, so I had to wait until I got back last week to start typing it up. I'd intended on getting this one uploaded and posted the previous week, but my roommate had been harping on my case to start Breaking Bad, and I'd promised I'd start once I got back from vacation, so... Yeah. That idea kind of fizzled out relatively quick and I got hooked.

Great show. I highly recommend it. It had the kind of ending that I love. So, in case you haven't guessed yet, I finished the show on late Wednesday night, so I did my damndest to hurriedly get this chapter finished up and uploaded for all of you to enjoy as much as I did.

Asia has arrived in Issei's life! You all are about to experience the twists and turns that accompany the DxD world with Naruto in it, and changes will occur. Some changes are minor, others are larger than you'd think. Will I reveal them? Only as I show them to you in my story.

Also, I received possibly the best news I've heard in months this past week: SEASON THREE OF DxD WAS ANNOUNCED THIS WEEK! For all of those who've read the Light Novels, like myself and my beta, please let me know what moment you're looking forward to the most. Personally, I've got two, and each occur at the end of Volumes Five and Six: The scene with Asia and Issei behind the gym (you all know the one!) and the Koneko on the train one (Kawaii OVERLOAD!). The Ossan everyone loves will be making his presence known as well!

In case you guys haven't figured it out yet, I can't wait for the announce date of the next season.

Shit. I didn't realize I got caught up in the moment until I'd gotten this much. Oh well, I won't delete any of it, it's wrong to mince words for such an awesome story!

Let's keep on churning onwards!

Your favorite,

dripley11


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

* * *

"We're back!" Naruto called out once he and Issei had returned to the Occult Research Club's clubroom.

"Ara, ara," Akeno greeted them with her usual prim giggles. "The two of you certainly made good time tonight."

"…Fast," Koneko observed from her usual spot on the sofa with another plate of food before her. "Could be record."

Issei blinked as the whiskered blonde shut the door behind them. "You mean you guys keep track of that stuff?" the younger teen asked the group of Devils.

"We do," the voice of their crimson-haired master answered. Naruto and Issei then both turned and each witnessed a fresh-out-of-the-shower Rias Gremory emerge from the Club's private bathroom with her drying her still-damp, lengthy locks with a grey towel. "Kiba currently holds the record, and while you came close, you didn't get the record."

"Damn," the cerulean-eyed youth grumbled. He then turned towards the only other blonde and guessed, "One hour flat?"

"Fifty-nine minutes three seconds, actually," Kiba informed him.

Naruto let out a low whistle in appreciation and complimented, "Now _that's_ pretty quick. So what's your secret, pretty boy?"

"I'm just very fast," the devil-boy returned vaguely without expounding any further.

"So how did it go tonight?" Rias prevented anything further from developing. "Any new contracts?"

"I got two, Buchou!" Issei proclaimed proudly.

"Very good, Issei," the beauty behind her desk congratulated him. She then turned and directed to Naruto, "And just how many did you get tonight, mister four-a-day?"

"I only got the one," he shrugged in response.

"_YES!_" Issei exclaimed excitedly. "I finally beat Naruto!"

"Too bad my _one_ contract was worth more than both of yours combined," the shinobi taunted airily with a sly smile, making Issei's victory dancing stop cold.

Issei's golden eyes creaked around until they were looking directly at his friend. He then gulped and asked, "Just how much was it worth?"

"Take a look for yourself," the spiky-haired blonde instructed before taking out a slip of paper and handing it over to Rias for inspection.

The azure-eyed beauty took the receipt from him and looked over it quickly, causing her eyebrows to shoot up and hide under her bangs from the shock caused. "That's…pretty good, Naruto," she complimented him with legitimate impressment in her tone. "Although I'm wondering why _you_ were the one called for such a job instead of me…"

The shinobi shrugged in response as he watched Issei's jaw drop down to the floor once Akeno had handed him the contract receipt. "I'm just that awesome, I suppose," the whiskered teen answered.

"How-How-How did you manage _that_!?" Issei shouted in disbelief once his jaw had returned to its normal position. "I mean, I could buy a _house_ with this reward!"

"Deception and infiltration are my specialties," Naruto told his friend as he sat down next to Koneko while making doubly sure he didn't attempt to steal any of her food while she sent him a suspicious glance. "Besides, I've got plenty of money already."

"Wait, you're _rich_!?" the brown-haired boy nearly shrieked in shock.

"I wouldn't say rich, per se," he told his longest-tenured flesh-and-blood friend. "Comfortable is the better word. Thanks to my book royalties, I don't even really need to work for a few years unless things go south pretty quick."

"What do you mean, Naruto-kun?" Kiba asked him confusedly.

"Rias," the jinchuuriki then requested, "could you pull the book out of your desk's second drawer. It's under the false bottom."

A solid dust of red appeared over Rias' cheeks as she turned to glare at her oldest friend. "You promised that you'd never tell," she growled at the Japanese beauty.

"Ara, ara," the raven-haired young woman giggled, "but I never broke my promise, Buchou. After all, it wouldn't be good for them to find _my _secret."

"It's under a tile in your kitchen, Akeno," Naruto informed everyone lazily, causing Akeno to freeze still as well. _Ah, the joys of Kage Bunshin Henge (Transformation),_ he thought with a superior grin hidden beneath a seemingly uncaring face.

"Ara, ara," the Yamato Nadeshiko turned towards him with a decidedly _dangerous_ grin on her face that reminded Naruto way too much of when Tsunade found him doing something remarkably stupid – like beating her at gambling. "Have you been peeping on me in my own home, Naruto-kun?"

"Nope," he truthfully denied smoothly while crossing his hands behind his neck. "As I said, infiltration is one of my specialties. I didn't ever go near your place while you were there, Akeno. It was just that your house seemed like the most secure one out of all of ours and I wanted to see if I still had it.

"But enough stalling," he finished. He then directed, "Rias-chan, if you would?"

"Fine," Rias groused with cherry-red cheeks. The Buchou then opened one of her desk's drawers, removed the false bottom, and pulled out a certain item. She threw it on the desk like it had burned her and she huffed, "There. Happy now?"

"Very much so," he grinned his foxy grin at her greatly-embarrassed red cheeks. Naruto then pointed to the desk and revealed, "That is why I'm not hurting for cash."

The entire room was so silent upon that declaration that the sound of a pin dropping would've echoed. Issei's eyes were as wide as saucers and his jaw had dropped so far that it somehow seemed to create a wormhole in the floor and the slacked jaw was currently pressing down on the crown of his brown-haired cranium. Koneko had frozen mid-bite and her blue ice cream was now dripping onto her school uniform. Kiba's traditional grin had suddenly turned _very_ nervous while he stood rigid in the corner of the room. Akeno's smile had turned into a seedy smirk and she just let out more and more of her giggles, and Rias' gobsmacked face had now changed into a shade of scarlet that could've even competed with Hinata's nuclear blushes.

"You-You-You mean," Issei finally managed to stammer out, "YOU'RE NAMIKAZE-SENSEI!?"

"Yep," Naruto nodded in confirmation. "My full name is Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze."

"Ara, ara," Akeno giggled while she turned her smirk on her oldest friend – who now looked positively mortified as she buried her face into her hands and let out a groan.

While he attempted to bask in Rias' shame, the jinchuuriki was suddenly wrapped in an absolutely bone-crushing hug from the lone true pervert within the room. "You're writing is _amazing_, Naruto!" Issei wailed as he cried anime tears of joy. "I have Deluxe First Editions of _both_ _Icha Icha_ books! Can I get you to autograph them for me?"

"Sorry, Issei, but I don't do autographs," the author told him, causing the boy to suddenly become downtrodden. "Also, you can't tell _anyone_ that I'm Namikaze. I _really_ don't wanna deal with rabid fans." He then turned and grinned towards the furiously blushing red-head, "And I'll be honest here: I'd have never suspected you were into _that _kind of thing, Rias-chan."

"It's all her fault," Rias told him childishly while pointing an accusing finger at her giggling friend. "Four months ago she wouldn't stop pestering me about 'these awesome stories' of hers until I gave in and read them both. You absolutely _cannot_ let my family know," she finished with a heated glare directed in his direction that would've cowed most had her face not still been beet-red.

"My lips are sealed," the smirking blonde promised innocently while making a zipper-sealing motion over his mouth.

"Naruto-senpai hentai also," Koneko observed from her spot. "Books porn."

"And how would _you_ know that, Koneko-chan?" the stories' writer queried curiously with an arched eyebrow. "Don't tell me _you've_ read this 'porn' as well?"

A faint tint of red dusted covered the younger girl's face before she turned away with an indignant huff. "Perverted classmates," she denied petulantly. "Found in Kiba-senpai's house."

"Oh ho," both Issei and Naruto's eyes glinted dangerously in the room's dim light as each then turned towards the visibly sweating pretty-boy of the group.

"A-A classmate introduced me to them," Kiba attempted to explain with a nervous smile that did anything but convince the pair of his obvious farce.

"You're _really_ a terrible liar, Kiba," Naruto chided him.

"Yeah!" Issei agreed. "Even I'm a better liar!"

"Now let's not get ahead of ourselves here, Issei."

The sound of a throat clearing ended Naruto and Issei's further banter and caused them both to look toward the sound's proprietor at the lone desk in the room. "As…enlightening as this conversation has been," Rias began with a small hint of crimson still staining her facial features, "we really should get a move on with tonight's major order of business."

"Okay then, what's up tonight?" the still-smirking shinobi asked.

"We'll explain once we arrive," the master responded while finally managing to throw off her embarrassment after hiding the book beneath the false bottom once again. She then stood up and instructed, "Akeno, prepare the Transportation Circle. You know where to."

"Hai, Buchou," the Japanese beauty acknowledged. She then held out an open palm and an Magic Circle large enough for the entire Occult Research Club to use appeared over a blank area of the room's floor.

"Uh… You guys do remember that Naruto and me can't jump, right?" Issei asked timidly.

"…Weak," the white-haired girl spoke in her usual monotone as she stood, making Issei hang his head sadly and mumble incoherent apologies again.

"Ara, ara," Akeno came over and grabbed one of Issei's hands before then beginning to lead him across the room and towards the glowing Circle. "Come along, Issei-kun. Your Akeno-senpai will take care of you no problem."

A perverted and dopey look crossed over the boy's face and a few drops of blood made their way down from his nostrils. "Okay, Akeno-senpai," he agreed wistfully.

Naruto shook his head at his friend's antics before he looked up once he felt a shadow over him and discovered the crimson-haired master looming over him. "And are _you_ going to help me make the jump, Rias-chan?" he asked childishly with a slight grin.

"As a matter of fact, I am," Rias replied with a slight upturn of her lips. "Seeing as how you and little Issei-kun are so hopeless, each of you need someone to hold your hands like a little baby."

"So if I'm the baby, then will you be my mommy?" he returned while attempting to sound like an infant.

Her azure eyes rolled in exasperation before she simply reached down and pulled Naruto up off of the couch. "Come along now," she chastised playfully. "We have important things to do now."

"Okay," he pouted without any deep meaning before simply following everyone out onto the Transportation Circle. "So how am I going to use this thing?"

"Like Akeno with Issei, you and I will simultaneously activate it," Rias explained to him. She then took his hand in one of hers and continued, "For now I want you to trust me and let me handle this, Naruto, and allow me to guide your trip. Transportation may be one of the simplest spells, but even a single misstep can end up sending your body into two different places."

Naruto nodded once to her in acceptance of her terms and the next thing he saw was a coat of crimson blotting out everything in his vision.

His cerulean eyes blinked only once and he quickly realized that the entire Occult Research Club had just had a complete change of scenery in a literal blink of an eye. _So that's what a teleportation feels like,_ he noticed while he flexed his fingers and tested out his body to ensure nothing was misplaced. _Felt kind of like my old man's Hiraishin (Flying Thunder God)._

"Um, Buchou," Issei called over from his position next to the dark-haired beauty. "Where are we?"

"About thirty miles outside of town," the azure-eyed leader replied, making Issei's eyes widen in astonishment. "We're here to deal with a Stray Devil that has been luring the local humans here and devouring them."

The teenaged wielder of the Boosted Gear grimaced in disgust at hearing her words while Naruto wondered, "And we're here because…"

"As the Devil placed in charge of this area, it is my responsibility to hunt down any Strays that are found to be in my jurisdiction," Rias explained. "Usually for a Stray Devil at only this one's level I'd only send Akeno and Kiba to handle it, but this is a good chance for the two of you to see how we Devils fight."

"So what exactly _is_ a Stray Devil?" the whiskered youth requested an explanation.

"A Stray Devil is a servant – usually an Evil Piece like us – who has given into their urges and left their masters," Akeno expounded for the two not in the know. "This one ran away because they desired more…_everything_ than their master would give to them."

_Sounds a lot like the nuke-nin system back home,_ Naruto realized the parallel. "Are there classifications for a Stray Devil's power?"

"Indeed there is, Naruto-kun," the crimson-haired master congratulated him with an appraising look in her eyes. "There are seven categories for a Stray Devil to be classified as: D, C, B, A, S, Double-S, and Triple-S." Naruto noticed Koneko's cheek twitch at the 'Double-S' class and he made a mental note to seek out and research Stray Devils in that classification. "D, C, and B class our group can handle, and this one here is a simple C-Rank. However, any Stray Devils of A-Class and above are dealt with by a more experienced group that is allied to the Gremory Family."

"Ss this one's basically cannon fodder then," the shinobi observed from all information granted. _Oh well,_ he mentally shrugged. _At least I shouldn't need to care about using up too much and showing my hand too early against this here Stray Devil._

"In essence, yes," Rias told him. "There shouldn't be any risk, but I don't want either you or Issei to directly engage Vizer; only observe tonight and act as my defense. Okay?"

"Gotha," the whiskered blonde accepted with a mock salute. He then added on in a high-pitched voice, "Aye, sir!"

"You've been watching too much anime," Issei told him while shaking his head in shame.

"And _you've_ been watching too much hentai."

"How'd you know that!?"

"Oh man, you really _do_!?"

"Ahem," Rias cleared her throat once more and stopped the two friends' bickering from degenerating even further again. "Now, if we could get back on subject, please? We have a Stray Devil to deal with."

"Okay, let's go!" Naruto proclaimed energetically while he bounced on the balls of his feet in excitement. _Man, I've been _aching_ for a little action!_

_**And it's about damn time we get some!**_ Kurama expressed his fellow dissatisfaction at how boring the world was being the past week. _**I need good entertainment in here! Just looking at the same sewer is annoying!**_

"Ara, ara," Akeno giggled at his energy while both Kiba and Koneko merely shook their heads in exasperation.

"Let's," Rias nodded in agreement. She then directed to the trio of long-standing members of her peerage, "You all know the drill."

"Hai, Buchou!" all three confirmed their orders. They group of six then made their way into the decrepit, dilapidated building with Kiba and Koneko in front, Rias and Akeno together in the middle, and both Naruto and Issei taking up the rear guard.

"Issei, stay alert and keep watch," the shinobi instructed his nervous friend. "Even if our enemy isn't that strong, never let your guard down while in their territory. Home-field advantage is a legitimate concern in a fight."

"H-Hai," Issei acknowledged his words before the boy's posture relaxed a slight fraction and he joined the blonde in glancing about in search of any potential threats to their group.

The crimson-haired beauty looked back over her shoulder and gave the blonde an impressed look and nod. He returned with a fellow inclination of his head and then went back to scanning his surrounding for any territorial disadvantages he'd need to account for.

_Whoever this 'Vizer' is isn't very good in picking their hideouts,_ the whiskered warrior thought with an unimpressed frown. _Too much clutter and no potential openings for either an ambush or an escape route on their part. Not even a Genin would've picked this place without some serious remodeling first._

_**You would've,**_ Kurama snarked.

"Hold," the group's leader commanded once they reached a large chamber that granted maximum maneuverability. She then stepped forward until all of her servants were behind her and she called out authoritatively, "Come out, Vizer! I am Rias Gremory, the Devil placed in charge of this district, and I am here to render judgment for your crimes. You have no chance of defeating either me or my servants."

"Isss that ssso?" a voice hissed from behind a stack of destroyed chairs and tables.

"This is your lone warning, Stray," Rias warned, and for an instant Naruto could picture her as a legitimate leader with how easily she sounded so strong. "Turn yourself over to our mercy and you _might_ receive a trial in the Underworld, but should you choose to resist you _will_ be obliterated," she finished with an icy glare directed towards the voice.

"They never choose to give up, do they?" Naruto asked Akeno under his breath.

"No, they don't," Akeno answered him with a positively delighted smile. She then licked her lips hungrily and let out a pleased moan and a small shift of her hips before saying, "And it's always such _fun_ to see them squirm."

The jinchuuriki quickly recognized the tell-tale signs of a legitimate sadist, grabbed a shivering Issei, and dragged the boy back a large step away from the Japanese young woman. _Now I know why he acted like that last week,_ he realized.

"Come and get me then," the Stray Devil replied to Rias' ultimatum arrogantly. A few pieces of wood creaked and a full grown woman's completely bare torso and head appeared out of the pile.

"Oh!" Issei's eyes went wide in amazement and a few stars appeared in his golden orbs. "Such a beautiful onee-sama with such a marvelous pair of oppai!"

"Issei," Naruto warned him in an even voice, causing the perverted boy to freeze. "What did I tell you about being a pervert in the middle of a fight?"

"To not be one and hold off until it's done," the brown-haired teen admitted sadly. "But we're not fighting her yet!" he protested.

"Actually," the shinobi told him before suddenly moving faster than the eye could see and grabbing a green tentacle-like appendage that had nearly gotten to his friend, "the battle began as soon as Vizer accepted the challenge." He then pulled out a kunai from his coat sleeve and severed the wriggling tentacle with his blue eyes colder than the Artic.

Issei took in a nervous gulp before stuttering out gratefully, "Uh, th-thanks for that, Naruto."

"Just don't let it happen again," he warned. "I've taught you better than that."

"Right," the gold-eyed boy acknowledged with a firm nod after shaking his jitters away. He then looked towards their opponent and both had their eyebrows shoot upwards while they watched the Stray Devil begin to fondle her nude breasts right in front of them. "Um… Naruto? Can I –"

"No," the shinobi answered after regaining his composure. _What the hell!? Not even Anko would do that!_

While the group just stared at the woman blatantly exposing them all to a teenaged boy's ideal peep-show, a pair of red Magic Circles appeared over her now-pert nipples. Naruto's danger senses went haywire just before the Devil's areola both expanded and suddenly began firing beams of energy at them all. However, before he could even warn them all, a small surge of power came from Rias' position at the head of the group and a gigantic crimson Magic Circle expanded outwards from her outstretched palm and absorbed the impact of each and every booby-bullet.

"What the fuck am I seeing here?" Naruto couldn't help but voice his disbelief – not at what Rias was accomplishing, but the attack Vizer just used. He rubbed his eyes and thought out loud, "I mean, I've heard of some pretty explosive tits, but that's just ridiculous."

Kiba just smiled his usual smile at him while Rias informed the new Devil, "There are a great variety of attacks and magical abilities, Naruto-kun." She then allowed her magical power to subside once the barrage of bullets had ceased and the Stray looked at them all with an arrogant disdain.

The Stray Devil let out a deliberate hiss in anger and then over a full dozen writhing green tentacles slithered out from underneath the mass of broken wood. "Let'sss sssee how you like thisss!"

"Koneko," Rias simply spoke without batting an eye as each of the visible writhing appendages all converged towards her.

"Hai," the smallest person present accepted before sprinting forward from her position and merely punched aside each and every one of the green weapons with her pink gloves on. She then crouched and leapt towards the nude form of the Stray Devil with her face never changing its expression in the slightest.

"You can't hope to defeat me, chibi," the Stray taunted her, causing one of the white-haired girl's eyebrows to twitch in annoyance.

"…Chibi?" Koneko repeated in her usual monotone once she landed in front of the enemy, but Naruto quickly noticed her body tense in what he perceived to be anger.

Vizer let loose an arrogant laugh and then stood herself up and revealed her true, monstrous body to everyone present. Issei blanched in disgust as a centipede-like body more than ten meters long was revealed with multiple wriggling appendages extending out of its sides showed itself.

"See just what I mean, Issei?" Naruto pointed to the disgusting form of their opponent and the pale boy followed the direction. "Not every pair of tits means a beautiful body. That's why you need to make sure the _hips_ are there and that's why I keep telling you the ass is better than the boobs. Boobs can be faked, but a good ass never lies."

"That's positively disgusting!" the perverted boy howled while covering his eyes from the sight. "Why must you lie to me, O' oppai!? Why deceive me so? That's a crime against all of nature! I'll never forgive you for this, you damned Stray Devil!" he screamed in rage, but his ranting and raving was silenced by his friend slamming a fist atop his skull and creating a small lump. "Ow! But thanks for that, Naruto."

"I'm here to help," he grinned back.

"Issei, Naruto," Rias' calm voice carried over and cut through the crashes of objects being thrown at the enemy and called out to them, "do either of you know much about Chess?"

"The game?" Issei checked, and received a nod from their master as an answer. "Not really. Naruto tried to teach it to me a few months ago, but it never really stuck with me."

"That's because the queen didn't have a pair of tits for you to ogle," Naruto grumbled in a huff. "But yeah, I am. An old buddy of mine taught me how to play something similar, and Chess wasn't that hard for me to learn afterwards."

"That's good," she complimented him with an appreciative nod. "You see, the Evil Piece system – the method used to reincarnate you both into Devils – is heavily based off of the game."

Before she could continue, however, the centipede-like body of the Stray Devil suddenly split open down the middle of the underside to reveal rows upon rows of dagger-like teeth within a great maw. "Koneko-chan!" Issei attempted to warn the girl, but was too late. The youngest member of the Occult Research Club was swallowed up by the large mouth.

"Relax," Rias assured the nearly frantic boy while Naruto watched on with a keen eye and Vizer continued to laugh victoriously. "Koneko may be small, but she is my Rook." Just as she finished informing them both, the maniacal Stray's gigantic body shuddered once before the large mouth was forced open from the inside, revealing a mostly fine – aside from her tattered uniform – Koneko. "The Rook Piece grants a person exceptional strength and an almost impenetrable defense."

"…Gross," Koneko spoke without emotion before she clenched her small fists tight and shattered the few teeth she'd been gripping. The small girl then hopped out of the three-meter length maw, turned towards the shrieking Devil, and sent the ten-foot-plus tall Stray hurtling across the observatory room with a single punch.

Naruto let out and an appreciative whistle while Issei's jaw hung slack at witnessing the tiny girl's might on full display. _Well, now I know how she crushed my hand,_ the blonde thought while feeling a phantom ache in his left hand.

"Kiba," the master then called as multiple more tentacles burst out of the rubble covering the crazed former servant. "If you would."

"Hai, Buchou," Kiba accepted with a respectful bow. He then held one of his hands out to the side and a bright glow suddenly manifested in his hand until it dimmed and unveiled a sword in his grip that came seemingly out of nowhere.

"I'm guessing that's his Sacred Gear?" the whiskered blonde deduced.

"Indeed it is, Naruto-kun," Rias nodded to his conclusion while the swordsman suddenly disappeared from sight. Naruto's experienced eyes were more than capable of following the speedy swordsman's path while she continued to further explain, "Kiba's Sacred Gear – Sword Birth – works marvelously well with the Knight Piece. You see, the Knight grants its owner exceptional speed."

The golden-eyed boy next to Naruto looked absolutely flabbergasted as he watched Kiba seemingly teleport across the room while continually slashing the many writhing appendages that attempted to make their way towards his master. "How's pretty boy teleporting?" Issei asked no one in particular.

"He isn't," the blue-eyed shinobi answered for him before anyone else could while he continued to observe Kiba's sharp movements. "Kiba's simply moving faster than you can see him. You'll be able to keep up with his movements once your eyes have grown accustomed to dealing with people going at speeds equal or greater than his."

"That's quite the claim, Naruto-kun," the azure-eyed teenage woman told him. "Kiba's sensei told him that my Knight is possibly even faster than him. I'm guessing that you can follow his movements?"

"I can," he nodded in response, but didn't elaborate any further than that.

"Take this," Koneko's voice interrupted any further probing as she jumped down from the room's rafters and buried a Rook-enhanced fist directly into their enemy's skull. Vizer loosed a primal scream in pain as it was forced onto the ground, its body littered with shallow slashes from Kiba's blade, from the blow's force and the shaking building dropped tons of debris atop the Stray Devil.

"Issei, summon your Sacred Gear," Naruto instructed him under his breath. "I want you to move and cover Akeno's back. Right now, that Stray's about to pull a desperate sneak attack."

"How do you –" Issei made to ask, but stopped once Naruto's icy eyes turned towards him with the 'Yamato look.' "Uh, sure, Naruto," he accepted uncomfortably before his left arm glowed and his red gauntlet formed. He then slowly moved behind an Akeno surprised at his initiative and his golden eyes then joined Naruto's in searching for any potential hostile movement directed at either of the two busty beauties.

"Akeno," Rias then commanded, shaking the girl away from her grateful smile.

"Hai, Buchou," the Japanese young woman acknowledged and her uniform then glowed brightly. She then thrust her arm into the air and her entire Kuoh uniform – plus all undergarments – seemingly evaporated into mid-air – leaving her body nude for all to see. Naruto had to smack the back of Issei's gawking head while holding his nose shut from seeing the positively beautiful girl's bare body. She then turned and her stunning legs were covered by a set of red hakama and her nude torso was then concealed beneath a white haori.

"She looks like a priestess," the brown-haired boy noticed out loud.

"Indeed she does, Issei," the red-haired beauty responded to his words. "Akeno is my Queen, and is also known as the Priestess of Thunder –"

"Issei, now!" Naruto cut her off in an order, and his friend immediately jumped into action once he also saw the movement coming from behind the duo of master and Queen.

Vizer's monstrous form suddenly exploded in full form from out of a pile of debris they'd not paid any attention to due to Akeno's transformation. "Take this, you ugly creature!" the Boosted Gear-wielding teen shouted with a war cry as he slammed a gauntlet-covered left into the massive centipede-like body at the very same instant that Naruto delivered a devastating left haymaker to the Stray's nude torso. The force of the two simultaneous blows sent the entire massive creature sailing through the air at such great speeds it whistled until it crashed through one of the building's foot-thick concrete walls and landed outside hit a great 'thud.'

The jinchuuriki stood up from the knee he's fallen on and dusted off his hands while musing aloud, "Well, I guess she's not gonna get up from that one." _That felt _good_ to finally fight again. Even if it was only at fifty-percent, that still was a good measure of my new strength._

"We did it!" Issei exclaimed gleefully while bouncing around in excitement. "That was _awesome_, Naruto! I can't believe I actually got a good hit in!"

"It's not quite done yet," the shinobi cut him off from his premature celebration while his eyes met with the curiously observing pair of his supposed master. "Sorry, but you were saying, Rias-chan?"

Before she could speak to him, a haunting shriek came from outside the building and they all turned to look out the huge hole in the wall and saw a grievously wounded Vizer attempting to crawl away from the group and preserve its life. Rias simply shook her head in pity and ordered evenly, "Akeno."

"Ara, ara," the raven-haired beauty giggled while a few sparks of electricity danced in her open palm. "Come now," she spoke with a decidedly pleased grin on her face directed towards the quivering Stray attempting to flee. "I never said this was over, Vizer-san." She then pointed her palm towards the heavily injured enemy and so much lightning danced in front of him that Naruto had to cover his eyes.

Yellow electricity completely coated Vizer's entire body and the foe let out a bloodcurdling shriek in absolute agony for a good solid thirty seconds before Akeno cut off the attack with an orgasmic moan and a coat of red staining her cheeks. The sadistic young woman licked her fingers sensually before she let loose another fit of giggles and flew out of the hole over to Vizer and reengaging her lightning.

"As I was saying," the crimson-haired beauty continued over the screaming of the Stray with a slight grimace while Akeno kept letting out pleased groans. "Akeno is my Queen, which has traits of each Evil Piece and is usually the strongest member aside from the King. Akeno, however, specializes in Magical attacks and the Queen Piece drastically increased all of their effects. She's also quite possibly the largest sadist you'll ever meet."

_She's not kidding!_ Naruto realized with his eyes shooting wide while Issei shuddered as if he was reliving a harrowing experience.

_**She's almost on par with that Snake woman,**_the biju within him noted with awe.

"Ara, ara," Akeno gasped in positive rapture once she'd ceased her continuous rain of lightning onto the almost-corpse spastically twitching in the grass. "Shall we continue our lesson then, Vizer-san?"

"Please just…kill me," Vizer begged them piteously.

"Allow me to grant your wish then, Stray Devil," Rias answered the request as she walked out of the hole in the wall with both Issei and Naruto trailing after her protectively. "This is Checkmate."

The King then spread her arms and a mass of dark energy coalesced in each of her open hands. The nature behind her power caused Naruto to shiver as the energy writhed about in her hands before a small, single stream of the mass came up from each of her hands and met together above her head. Rias' attack then quickly enveloped the entire smoking body of Vizer and completely obliterated any and all trace of the massive bulk.

The shinobi blinked dumbly at the display before him since he'd never even _heard_ of such a technique before. He rubbed his eyes to check if they were still working right and he asked, "Just what kind of jutsu was _that_?"

"_That_," the perpetrator behind his befuddlement answered, "was my power, Naruto-kun: Known as the Power of Destruction. Anything my power consumes is completely obliterated down to the cellular-to-atomic level; leaving no trace whatsoever of whatever I attack behind."

"Damn," the veteran of the Fourth Great Shinobi War breathed out in awe. _Not even _Madara_ could do that. Not to self: _Don't_ seriously piss off Rias-chan._

"Um, Buchou," Issei chimed in nervously once the deed had been done. "You never said what Piece Naruto and me are."

The azure-eyed girl turned toward the pair of friends and answered him with a soft smile, "You, Issei, are my Pawn."

He tried to hold it in, he really did, but Naruto suddenly barked out in laughter while the brown-haired boy's jaw dropped in disbelief and he howled, "You mean the one closest to the fuckin' front line!?"

"Oh…Oh man," the blonde breathed out as he wiped his wet eyes once he had managed to regain control, but still a few chuckles came from his throat once he saw his friend sulking with both Akeno and Kiba attempting to console him. He then asked, "And me?"

The crimson-haired young woman hesitated in her answer, causing his curiosity to peak. "I…don't honestly know," she answered reluctantly. Every member of the Occult Research Club then stared at her in curiosity while she further expounded, "The Piece I used on you, Naruto, was a Unique Piece – the first I'd ever seen. A Unique Piece is quite literally a one-in-a-billion Piece that no one really knows anything about aside from the Evil Piece's creator: Ajuka Beelzebub-sama. I've only ever heard of Three Unique Pieces through all of the Evil Piece system's history, so to be honest, I don't know for certain what Piece you are or even what boons the Piece gave you."

Naruto simply stood stock-still as her words worked their way into his cranium and his brain worked overtime to attempt to digest just what he'd been told. Eventually he shook his head to break his trance before growing a toothy grin and saying with a slightly teasing lilt, "So what you're saying is that I'm a one-in-a-billion, is that right, Rias-chan?"

"Don't get too full of yourself, Naruto-kun," she returned with a playful smirk.

_**He already is,**_ Kurama piped up, but since no one other than his container could hear him he was ignored.

"By the way, Rias-chan, that was pretty heartless of you with that Stray," he continued to say, but hid the message under a teasing banter. "Now I worry if you have anything but ice in your chest."

"I have a heart," she returned with a slightly intense look in her eyes at the barely-hidden accusation. She then continued their playful banter, "But I only have a heart for my cute little servants."

"Am _I_ the cutest?" the whiskered blonde asked her with an innocent look, only for her reply to be a few shakes of her head in bemusement.

"I wanna be the cutest!" Issei whined despairingly as his shoulders slumped.

"Ara, ara," Akeno turned toward the Sekiryuutei wielder with a few of her usual giggles and her small smile back in place. "Don't worry, Issei-kun, _I_ think my darling kouhai is the cutest."

Unbidden, both Issei and Naruto simultaneously felt shivers travel down their spines as the image of ten minutes ago came forth in their minds.

* * *

"Something's off here," Naruto realized as he stood outside the home of one of his regular customers. He then made his only clone and instructed it, "Go back to the Clubroom and get Rias-chan and the others. I get the feeling this is a trap."

"On it, boss," the mirror-image saluted before jumping onto a rooftop and departed towards Kuoh Academy.

_I hope I'm just being paranoid here, but I've fallen into too many traps to think that._ He then added,_ I really hope Shiina-san is okay._

As soon as Naruto opened the unlocked front door and entered he felt a strange feeling completely wash over him that ended up giving him goosebumps. His eyes narrowed in concentration once he realized he'd just walked into a barrier and he pulled out a kunai in preparation for a battle. Just to be certain, he pulled at the entryway's door once again only to discover that it was sealed shut and couldn't be opened without forcing it by using more power than he was comfortable releasing in such a populated area. Steeling himself for a fight, the shinobi slowly crept along the length of the hall towards the living room without making a single sound with his bladed weapon held at the ready.

Once he reached the doorway into the den, a scent he'd never wished to smell again assaulted his acute olfactory senses. He closed his eyes and quickly squashed the guilty feeling clawing at his chest as he reminded himself of his sensei's lessons on keeping focused on the task at hand. His cerulean eyes then slowly opened with a burning intensity behind them while he allowed his anger to drive him but not to cloud his judgment.

The jinchuuriki took in one last deep breath before quickly turning the corner and his eyes quickly darted around the room in search of an assailant. After a few tension-filled minutes, none of his senses were able to detect the perpetrator and he silently moved around the large puddle of blood on the floor until he was at his contractor's side.

The blonde knelt down and one of his hands went to the man's neck in order to check for a pulse only to discover that there was none. A pang of sadness wormed its way into his chest and the Devil silently offered a prayer to whatever deity that would listen for his now-deceased friend to find peace in whatever afterlife there may be.

It was the same instant that the deliberating headache came unto him that his ears heard the sound of clothing rustling. His danger senses going positively haywire, Naruto quickly leapt away from the fresh, still-warm corpse and took cover behind one of the room's small sofas while grimacing in pain. It was just as he managed to get behind the cover that he heard a trio of 'bangs' ring out and three 'thuds' then collided with the blood-red piece of furniture.

"Praise the Lord!" a crazed voice echoed in the room. "A shitty Devil has come just for me to kill him!"

_Shit,_ the blonde thought through a haze of searing pain in his head. _I can't focus with this headache. Kurama!_

_**I'm working on it,**_ the being responsible for his supernatural healing told him. _**However, it'll take a minute to force it out.**_

_I don't care, just hurry up!_ "Who are you?" he demanded of the as-of-yet unseen foe in an attempt to help buy Kurama time to heal him further. "Did you kill Shiina?"

"Indeed I did kill that shitty devil-lover!" the enemy – a man, Naruto guessed, based on his voice and weight judging from his steps – answered with glee. "And why should I tell my name to a devils who's about to die?"

"Because you're about to find out I'm a lot harder to kill than you think," Naruto responded icily. Still fighting through the aching behind his skull, he rolled out from behind the sofa and let his kunai fly in the direction the voice had come from.

His opponent, now revealed to be a young man wearing an odd arrangement of clothing and white hair, jumped to the side in order to avoid the sailing weapons. He then directed a metallic weapon Naruto realized was similar to the ones he'd seen a few police officers carry around and squeezed the trigger.

A tremendous 'bang' came from the small firearm and Naruto's instincts quickly took over. The blonde fell to the ground to avoid the speedy projectile and he immediately rolled to the side to avoid the multiple follow-up shots sent his way.

The jinchuuriki used his arms to jump to his feet once he'd rolled against a piece of furniture while simultaneously sliding the end table towards his foe to temporarily stop the assault. The white-haired enemy nimbly stepped out of the way and had an insane grin on his face as he pulled the trigger once more. Now that he'd found time to compose himself a little, Naruto quickly tensed his legs and jumped back onto the wall to dodge the bullet fired. Knowing he still couldn't stick to the wall yet, the shinobi instead pushed his feet off of the wall and went soaring through the air towards his attacker.

Reacting far faster than Naruto had believed possible for a normal human to be capable of, the red-eyed foe ducked under the charge and the Devil suddenly felt a searing pain erupt from his left calf once he felt something pierce it. The blue-eyed warrior grunted in a grimace as he somersaulted into a crouch with white-hot agony swimming through his leg.

"It hurts, doesn't it?" the man taunted him. "That's the power of what Light weapons do to you shitty devils! They completely destroy you!"

_Fuck,_ he silently cursed as he shakily stood. The blonde winced in pain as he turned towards his foe and glared at the young man in smoldering fury. _Kurama?_

_**Working on it,**_ the biju answered him. _**That red-head wasn't lying, apparently. If you didn't have my healing factor working with you, you wouldn't even be able to stand right now. That's how much damage Light is doing to your body, Naruto.**_

_Good to know you're still good for something, you mangy fox,_ the whiskered teen quipped with a wry grin making its way onto his face.

"Oh? What's this? A shitty Devil who _likes_ being stabbed? You must be quite the M!" the white-haired enemy declared with a mad cackle that reminded Naruto far too much of a certain Snake Sannin. The young man across the room was now equipped with a glowing, pulsing white blade in the hand opposite the one with the gun which just the sight of made the blonde's hair stand up on end.

_Where'd he pull that thing out of?_ the shinobi couldn't help but wonder on the meter-long blade.

"Here then, have some more _pleasure_!" the crazed youth screamed in glee before firing a trio of projectiles at Naruto from his gun.

The blonde moved faster than the naked eye could see as he avoided each bullet sent his way easily aside from the burning scrape one of his hands received. He winced in pain as more agony arced up his limb and he turned back towards his foe while pulling out another kunai in order to block the vertical slash coming down at his head.

Naruto winced as another lance of hurt came from the hand both holding his kunai and keeping the blade of Light away from his body. Once he realized that his kunai was being steadily sliced through, the whiskered warrior quickly raised his left leg and kicked out at his foe's torso. However, the man's quickness and agility proved to be enough to disengage from the battle of wills and avoid the leg by jumping back.

_He's good,_ the shinobi realized as his hand's scrape was covered in red energy and finished healing over. _Probably on par with quite a few Jounin in his taijutsu ability alone. He's also got a fair tactical mind as well, since he forced me to use both my wounded leg and hand together to prevent his sword from reaching me. Had I not been so gifted naturally, I'd probably be dead right now._ His icy blue eyes narrowed at his opponent and he demanded, "Just who the hell are you?"

"Just a priest who enjoys killing all of you shitty Devils!" the priest exclaimed with a crazed grin. "And your executioner!" He then pointed his gun at the Devil and squeezed the trigger once more, only this time for his weapon to 'click' in a lack of reaction.

Seeing his opportunity, Naruto leapt into action and moved towards his enemy before he could attempt to reload. The man's beady red eyes widened in surprise for a moment until he noticed Naruto's movement, threw the empty gun away to the side, and moved to reengage the blonde in close quarters. The Light blade and one of Naruto's kunai met between the two fighters and their faces were barely an inch from one another until Naruto suddenly spun out of the engagement and swept the priest's legs out from under him.

The white-haired youth hit the floor hard and immediately rolled to the side and out of the way of the trio of kunai that buried themselves into the floor right where he'd been, and in the same movement he managed to make it back to his feet. The shinobi threw one last kunai at his foe only for the youthful enemy to slice the kunai in half with his own blade and each half collided with the wall behind him.

The two warriors stared at one another for one more brief, strained moment before they both charged once more. The priest horizontally slashed his hissing blade once they'd gotten close enough for him to, but Naruto simply slid down under the blade and went under the young man's legs, catching his foe completely by surprise. The shinobi quickly righted himself and spun a tremendous back-kick directly into the center of the priest's back before he could offer any kind of resistance, sending the red-eyed male careening across the room and into one of the bookshelves. The shelves were emptied by the impact and each tome fell atop the limp body and the wooden piece shuddered once, but it didn't fall on top of the defeated young man as well.

_That should've taken care of him,_ the shinobi thought, only for his brows to shoot upwards in surprise once he witnessed the pile of books shake and the man emerge. The young enemy shakily stood from the pile of knowledge with his sword now deactivated while he cradled his non-sword arm. "What– How!? I put enough into that kick to shatter your spine!"

A trail of blood joined multiple others in trickling down the priest's face as he spat out a glob of blood and grew another insane, albeit painful, grin. He chuckled bitterly and answered, "Oh, it hurts like a bitch, but you'll have to try much harder if you wanna put _me_ down for good. I've killed more of your kind than I can count, and each and every one of them was stronger than me physically."

_That was actually pretty sane of him,_ the blonde thought, slightly impressed at this turn of events.

"Girl, get in here!" the priest suddenly shouted, taking Naruto completely by surprise. "I need to be healed!"

"Huh?" the whiskered teen wondered aloud, curious as to whom else was there, since he'd not felt any other presences that had negative emotions at all.

"Freed-san!" a young girl's worried voice made Naruto turn towards its source to confirm if she was another enemy, only for his eyes to go wide in shock as he realized just who she was.

_Asia,_ he thought, stunned, as the blonde girl with the emerald-green eyes in the nun outfit hurried across the room toward her supposed partner.

"Here," Asia soothed the man – Freed, now that there was a name to that insane grin – as she held up her hands to the man's grievously wounded body. A bright green glow then came from a pair of silver rings on her fingers and Freed's wounds closed up as if they'd never even existed – even his broken arm looked good as new!

"Gotcha!" Freed proclaimed victoriously as he pulled out another pistol and fired it at the stunned Naruto.

A pained grunt escaped from the whiskered youth as the bullet directly collided with his left shoulder and buried itself deep into his collarbone. The sheer amount of agonizing agony swimming through his body's veins from the direct impact with a Light bullet forced him to a knee. "Shit," he cursed under his breath. "Kakashi-sensei would've had my head for that lapse."

"Naruto!" a worried voice he immediately recognized as Issei's came from behind him, and the blonde felt a smirk form as he realized that the cavalry had arrived at long last, though he shouldn't have even needed them. "We're here to help, buddy!"

"About damn time you guys showed up," the injured youth quipped dryly through gritted teeth as he stood up and continued to glare at his opponent.

"Apologies for the delay," Rias professed, "but there was a fairly high-level barrier surrounding the place. We couldn't get in until it went down."

"Well," Naruto winced, "better late than never, I suppose."

"Well lookie here, more shitty Devils to kill," Freed gleefully stated while his sword hummed into being from the golden hilt in his hand. He then crossed his gun over the hilt of his blade and everyone prepared for another round.

"I-Issei-san," Asia's timid voice carried across the room. "Is-Is that really you?"

"Yeah," the brown-haired boy admitted to her with a resigned air about him. "I didn't' want you to find out, so I didn't plan on us meeting ever again. I'm sorry you had to find out this way, but I'm a Devil, Asia."

The green-eyed nun's eyes were wet at hearing the admission and her hand rose to cover delicate mouth, "But…But you were so –"

"Shut it, witch!" Freed scolded loudly as he suddenly backhanded the innocent girl across the face.

"Asia!" Issei cried out instinctively and move to help her.

"Issei, don't –" Rias tried to warn him, but was too late.

Freed's pistol immediately went towards the unaware teen and two shots were fired; both pierced each thigh. The boy let out a cry of pain and was sent tumbling onto the floor while blood began to spurt from his wounds.

"Issei-san!" the blonde girl shouted. She was then whisked away from the mad priest's side so quickly that nobody noticed until she reappeared in Naruto's arms next to the injured teen.

"Can you heal him?" the blue-eyed friend asked the female as he set her down. "I saw you heal that bastard."

The shaken girl looked directly into his icy blue eyes and she barely managed a nod. "I…I can," she revealed to him.

"Oh no you don't!" the mad priest shrieked. He then pointed his Light pistol at the trio but was forced to abandon his potential attack in order to avoid a strike of Akeno's lightning.

"Ara, ara," the Japanese Queen giggled as she licked her lips hungrily. "Now you look like you could use some _instruction_, Exorcist-san."

"…Here," Koneko's toneless voice came and Freed had to jump to the side to avoid her floor-cracking fist.

While Koneko and Akeno both occupied the priest's attention, both Rias and Kiba made their way over towards the odd trio with Kiba keeping a keen eye on their foe in order to make certain he couldn't sneak past the other two. "What are you doing?" the master hissed and Kiba summoned one of his swords – this one pitch-black.

"Helping Issei," the deadly jinchuuriki answered in a steady voice. He then nodded towards the small nun and implored, "Please help that idiot."

"I…I will," Asia promised with a firm nod. She then placed both of her hands over the groaning Issei's legs and the same green glow from earlier came into existence. The two Devils who hadn't seen her power in action before stared in wonder as the boy's wounds were completely healed to the point that it seemed as if he hadn't even been shot in the first place.

Naruto helped his friend sit up while Rias breathed out in awe, "A Sacred Gear that can actually heal a _Devil_."

"Are you fine now, Issei-san," the green-eyed girl asked gently.

"Yeah," the teenage boy answered her with a grateful smile. "Thanks for that, Asia."

Before she could say anything further, however, Freed interrupted the moment, "You're in deep shit now, you witch! Not only did you let the barrier fall, but you just healed a _Devil_!"

The gentle girl paled right as Naruto's acute sensory abilities picked up a group of four Fallen Angels approaching their position speedily. While he was certain he could defeat them all on his own, he realized that engaging so many in such a well-populated area was a bad idea. "Rias," he warned.

Freed let out a few mad cackles as a purple-and-black portal began to form above their heads on the room's ceiling. "And now you bunch of shitty Devils are _really_ done for!" he exclaimed. "Here come my friends!"

"Let's go," the King commanded, and both Akeno and Koneko immediately returned to her side. "We came only to retrieve Naruto, and our objective has been accomplished. Akeno, take us back."

"Hai, Buchou," the Queen accepted with a nod. She then held out a hand and a large crimson Magic Circle formed underneath them all.

Rias' azure eyes softened as she turned her gaze towards the smaller blonde girl and told her, "I thank you for helping my servant, Asia-san. However, I cannot bring you with us. You should return to your church."

A single tear trailed down the gentle young woman's cheek and she nodded in acceptance of her fate. She then stood back up, turned away from the group of Devils, and began to walk back towards her fellow exorcist, only for him to slap her so hard across the cheek that the action echoed in the room's silence.

"Asia!" Issei's frantic cries echoed as he frantically tried to get away from Naruto's firm hold. "Buchou, _please_, let's take her with us!" he pleaded.

The crimson-haired master only shook her head sadly and informed him, "This Magic Circle only works for members of my House, Issei. That nun can't come with us."

"Asia!" he tried again before turning towards his friends cold eyes, and the betrayal within those golden orbs nearly made Naruto let him go, but he managed to right the hitch in his throat. "Naruto," he practically begged of his friend, only to be bitterly disappointed when the blonde merely shook his head.

"Issei-san," Asia's soft voice came to them, and the pair of Devils turned to see her shakily attempting to push herself off of the ground. Her right cheek was burned red and pulsed from the blow she'd just received and she told them, "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine. I promise."

"Asia," Issei nearly sobbed as a few tears of dismay made their way down his face. "I swear I'll rescue you, Asia! I promise I will!"

"Goodbye, Issei-san," the teary-eyed blonde nun parted with him once the teleportation magic activated and the entire group of Devils was whisked away from the heart-wrenching scene.

* * *

**A/N:** And that's a scene!

Before someone asks why, yes, I did take some creative liberties with the Vizer battle in comparison to how the anime did it. Answer: Because I felt like it, and I am the God of this story. The real answer is that I just liked Issei's quote in the first season's second OVA (Otherwise referred to as episode fourteen), "Why is it that all of our opponents have tentacle-like abilities. Not that I mind, though."

And so the Asia arc is going to reach its climax in the next chapter. Hope I got you all riled up enough for it, because it's a doosy, I'll say.

No doubt there will be the usual, "How could Freed challenge Naruto? I mean, isn't Naruto a God?" Answer: No, he isn't a God, but he _is_ quite powerful. So much so that he is in the same boat as Superman, I guess, in how he has to continually hold back his full power or risk harming people he doesn't want to hurt. Also, Freed's weapons cause damage Naruto hasn't ever faced before; not even back in the Elemental Nations. So, there's that as well.

Whelp, there's Chapter Four. Chapter Five will be out next week.

Ja ne!


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

* * *

The sound of a slap echoed in the completely silent clubroom. "What was that, Issei?" Rias growled at the defiant boy.

"I said then let me leave your House so I can save Asia on my own," the teenage youth repeated unflinchingly. "If you won't let me save her as one of your servants, then cut me off so that I can do it alone. All you'd lose is a single sacrificial pawn, right? You won't lose hardly anything."

"So you think that because you're a Pawn then you're basically meaningless, is that it, Issei?" Naruto's cold tone sliced through the room.

The brown-haired boy's head whirled around and he glared at his blonde friend just as heatedly as he did Rias. "Isn't that how it works?" he pointed out bitterly. "The Pawn is sacrificed so another piece can get what the _King_ wants. After all, the pawn is the weakest piece, _Naruto_."

"True," the blue-eyed young man accepted with a small nod while he suppressed an internal wince at how biting Issei's words were. _I need to be careful here to not push him too far,_ he reiterated. "You are right that, in the beginning of the game, the pawn is the weakest piece on the board, but tell me, Issei: Do you know why some people claim the Pawn is the most _powerful_ Piece?"

"Promotion," the crimson-haired beauty answered for the now-confused Pawn. "Just like in Chess, when an Evil Piece Pawn reaches enemy territory – like the church on the hill for instance – the Pawn can use Promotion and be granted the abilities of any Piece aside from the King; meaning you could become a Rook, Knight, or even a Queen temporarily, Issei."

"Huh?" Issei queried confusedly while Akeno entered into the room, walked over to her master's side, and whispered something in her ear.

"Very well then," Rias sounded pleased as she straightened her attire and wiped off some imaginary dust. "Naruto-kun, Akeno, and I have an important matter to take care of now. Kiba, Koneko, I want the two of you to protect Issei."

"Hai, Buchou," both of her addressed servants accepted their orders with a slightly knowing look in their eyes.

"Issei," Naruto requested of his friend, who turned back to glare in his direction once more. "Believe me when I say that I _do know_ how it feels to be helpless, but also remember that you're anything but. I know me bringing you back from the Mall earlier wasn't what you wanted, but I swear to you that I'm still and always will be on _your_ side. Do you recall my first lesson to you last week? What was the mantra I drilled into your head?"

"Always look underneath the underneath," Issei mumbled out like it gave him a bad taste in his mouth. "But what does that have to do with what's happening now?"

"Follow that advice I gave you and you'll figure it out for yourself," the whiskered blonde answered vaguely. The shinobi then pushed himself off of the wall he'd been leaning on during the entire procession that'd just occurred and began to make his way towards the two waiting beauties standing by the Teleportation Magic Circle. Before they left, he turned towards the two charged with protecting his friend and said to the pair, "Be careful, Kiba, Koneko-chan. Also, be sure not to let that idiot kill himself while I'm gone."

"We will do our best," the blonde Knight bowed in acknowledgment.

"…Will do my best also," the white-haired girl responded.

The jinchuuriki nodded in appreciation to each of them before turning and informing the two ladies that he was ready. Nobody saw it, but as the Magic Circle activated a feral grin crossed over Naruto's whiskered cheeks that would've sent any who'd seen it scurrying for safety.

"I told you – wait, there's three of them!" a childish-sounding voice came from above the trio of Devils once they'd arrived at their destination. "Wait. Where's the dolt with the brown hair? I only see a blonde with whiskers."

"It seems you were wrong again, Mittelt," a deep voice that Naruto recognized as the Fallen Angel who'd stabbed him – Dohnaseek was his name, according to the rest of the Occult Research Club. "This blonde, however, is the one I told you all about."

"You mean that imbecile you killed for defending the one Raynare killed?" the voice identified as Mittelt came from above and to Naruto's left.

"Truly?" a third voice – feminine by its sound – asked.

"Indeed he is, Kalawarner," Dohnaseek confirmed.

Naruto's cerulean eyes panned up and he witnessed a trio of people floating in the air with feathery black wings spread and flapping in the night sky above the trees. The two he'd never seen before were both women – one looking in her mid-twenties while the other looked barely older than Koneko. The more mature woman had her violet hair cut in such a fashion that it covered one of her violet eyes and she wore a purple trench-coat like top that bared a good bit of her pair of mature breasts. The childish-looking Fallen Angel he'd never had the fortune of meeting before was dressed in a gothic Lolita style outfit with her blonde hair hanging from her head in twin side-pigtails and intense sapphire eyes staring down at him that belied her true arrogance and overconfidence.

"Good evening to you all," Rias greeted their enemies for the night cordially. "Would this happen to be all of you?"

"Raynare's finishing up the ceremony, but we're more than enough to handle three Devils," Mittelt – the smallest one – spat down at them while looking down at each of them. "Sad to say, but your rescue attempt is about to fall utterly short."

"Ara, ara," Akeno giggled at them before suddenly shooting her open hand up and hundreds of crimson Magic Circles completely surrounded the area of forest that the sextet were in. "Why, whoever said that _we_ were the rescue team?"

"What!?" the blonde chibi shrieked. "And I was so _certain_ they'd try and come in from the back!"

"This is a fairly high level barrier," the other female – Kalawarner, if he guessed – noted out loud after inspecting the spell cast. "The only way for the three of us to break it and get out is to kill the caster or get her to drop the spell."

"Sounds fun to me," the lone male Fallen Angel grinned viciously down at the three Devils.

"Oh, I assure you it will be," Naruto promised each of them. He cracked his neck to the side and flexed his muscles once before thanking his master, "I owe you one for this, Rias-chan. Now I can _really_ test out my new strength for once."

"No problem, Naruto-kun," she accepted his thanks with a small nod. "Just don't take too long. We _do_ have a schedule to keep."

"Gotcha," the blonde shinobi acknowledged once he'd gone over his plan for the night one last time and found himself satisfied. He then called up to the trio of winged adversaries and asked them, "So am I going one-on-one, or are all three of you assholes gonna come at me at once?"

The chibi's face turned red in anger at his words, Kalawarner laughed at Mittelt's face, and Dohnaseek chuckled in amusement in response to his challenge. "I killed you once, Devil. I can do it again without any help," he finished in acceptance to the one-on-one series.

"No fair!" the smallest blonde pouted petulantly. "I wanted to kill him for him calling me an asshole!"

"You can have one of the other two," the older man told the small one.

"If that's your decision," the shinobi spoke in a low whisper while his body shook in anticipation of the fight to come. "Rias, Akeno, stay back. This won't take long. Thirty seconds, tops."

"Hai, Naruto-kun," the Priestess of Thunder nodded before creating another barrier around both her and her master.

"Show me your stuff, Naruto-kun," Rias gave him a wry grin.

_**He already has,**_ the perverted fox attempted to chime in, but was ignored one more time.

The whiskered blonde then turned his back to his opponents and gave his master an overly-dramatic bow with an arm stretched across his chest. "It shall be as you command, my Mistress," he accepted like how a traditional butler would. Rias' eyes shone with amusement at his antics until he suddenly began rolling to the side in order to avoid a pair of Light spears heaved down at him from on high. "Well that wasn't very nice," he scolded the Fallen Angel's impatience.

Dohnaseek merely shrugged once and informed him condescendingly, "You really shouldn't turn your back on your enemy. Doing so will just get you killed."

The shinobi on the ground looked up at his foe and gave him a false air of civility while advising, "And _you_ really shouldn't ever underestimate your enemies." The blonde's smiling form then suddenly disappeared from sight and then reappeared over the stunned Dohnaseek with his devil wings extended and he delivered a double-hammer fist down onto the man's fedora-covered scalp.

The older man's listless body plummeted down from the sky so fast that it whistled in the air until its collision with the ground created a solid 'boom' and created a crater six-feet deep, fourteen-feet in diameter. The impact's strength was so great that even nearly a full dozen trees were torn from their roots by the gale created from the shock wave of the man's body.

"Dohnaseek!" Kalawarner cried out in both concern and alarm once she'd regained her wits and flapped her wings, darting through the air toward the man's prone, unmoving form. She kneeled down at his side and felt for a pulse until she eventually let out a sigh in relief. "He's alive," she let out the breath she'd been holding at the discovery.

The blonde girl, however, was still frozen stock-still in the air with her sapphire-blue eyes wide and her jaw slack from how stunned she remained. "What-What-What," she stuttered out incoherently. "What the hell just happened!?"

"I did," the shinobi chirped brightly from directly behind her, startling her so much that she eeped and attempted to quickly separate herself from him. "You see, that's what happens to people who make the mistakes of underestimating me _and_ trying to harm someone I care about."

"Mittlet!" the other female warned as she quickly flew up and slashed her spear of Light at the unfazed jinchuuriki, which he easily avoided but elected to retreat back to the ground in order to allow the two remaining possible opponents to discuss their options rather than end it all too easily.

"Why isn't he dead?" Rias immediately demanded an explanation from him once he'd reached the ground in front of the two beauties once more. "Or must I remind you that he's the reason you almost died?"

Naruto's responsive chortles brought the King up short and she just blinked at him in schock. "If I killed everyone who's ever tried to do me in, Rias-chan, then I'd have never had any friends," he revealed to her. Her azure eyes widened a fraction while he continued, "Besides, what reason do I have to kill a man I outclass so much?"

"He's a Fallen Angel," she pointed out to him like it was enough reason for his very existence to be wiped off the face of the map.

The jinchuuriki couldn't hold back his derisive snort before reminding her of his position, "Like I care about all that stuff. Look, I don't kill unless I absolutely _have_ to, Rias-chan. I _refuse_ to ever belittle my godfather's dream in such a way."

"And just what dream was that?" Rias probed curiously while attempting to veil her interest in getting him to reveal more about his hidden past.

"Something you wouldn't understand," he murmured back tersely. _I succeeded once, Ero-sennin, and I swear that your dream will reach this world too._

Noticing his body language, Rias elected not to probe any further into his past and respected his decision. A brief blank look crossed over the crimson-haired girl's face and she eventually revealed, "Oh. Issei's just Promoted for the first time."

"Did he go Queen like I said he would?"

"Nope. Rook," she answered him with a victorious grin stretching her beautiful face while Naruto cursed under his breath. "I do believe that you owe me, Naruto-kun."

"I knew I shouldn't have ever made a deal with a Devil," the cerulean-eyed teen mumbled while her grin grew even larger. He ignored the part of his brain attempting to reiterate to him that _he_ was, in fact, a Devil as well.

"…you know as well as I how strong Dohnaseek was," Naruto's enhanced hearing managed to pick up the whispers coming down from above. Kalawarner's voice then continued, "He was the strongest out of all of us aside from Raynare-sama, and he beat him in _one_ blow. He's lucky he's not dead!"

"But still!" the smaller one attempted to protest, aghast at the notion they were discussing. "For us to retreat and admit defeat to a lowly low-class Devil is too much to bear! We'd be laughed at the instant we stepped back into the Grigori."

"That's if Azazel-sama doesn't kill us himself," the older woman reminded her compatriot. "Remember that we've been going against orders ever since Raynare-sama killed that boy even though Azazel-sama just wanted him watched over."

"And you wanna beg for mercy from him!?" Mittelt berated. "You know what Shemhaza and Kokabiel did to the last deserters they found!"

"That's why I propose going directly to Azazel-sama," the mature Fallen Angel countered. "He'll have us severely punished, yes, but he wouldn't have us executed over something like this. At the very least we'd still be alive – which I'm not certain we would be if we kept going like this."

"I didn't even see him move, and he beat Dohnaseek like he was nothing," Mittelt admitted with a noticeable shiver. "He could've very easily killed him, and us, but he didn't for some reason. So you're certain of this, Kalawarner?"

"It's our best option," Kalawarner insisted her plan. "And even if we did – by some miracle – manage to defeat him, there's still those other two to worry about, and both of them have powers on par with a High-Class Devil. With just the two of us, we'd wind up slaughtered no matter what if we keep fighting here."

"There's also no guarantee those two would let us live," the blonde girl added in another possible outcome.

"What are those two doing up there?" Rias' voice broke him away from his concentration.

"They're debating on whether to surrender to me or not," Naruto answered her question even though it hadn't been directed at him. "It would seem my little show of strength and speed was enough to give them some serious doubts."

"How can you tell?"

He pointed to one of his ears and informed her, "I've got really good ears."

The King huffed in impatience at hearing his vague answer before saying to him, "Can you hurry this up, Naruto-kun? Things are still progressing at the church, you know?"

"I know that," he responded with his eyes never straying from the pair of Fallen Angel women still up in the sky directly over the waning moon's shining surface. "But you can't rush these things, Rias-chan. If you merely let them stew like I'm doing, then they usually wind up talking themselves out of the fight and then that's that."

"And should they choose to keep on fighting?" the Devil leader presented another possible outcome of his waiting. "What will you do then?"

"What I just did to their friend," the blonde warrior replied to her with his voice steady. "However, they and I both now know that they don't stand a chance at defeating me, and I'm betting on them choosing to live and fight another day."

"You there, Devil!" the other blonde called down from up high. "One who defeated Dohnaseek! What's your name?"

The whiskered blonde grinned once he realized that he'd won and he answered Mittelt, "Naruto."

The two female Fallen Angels descended from the sky slowly while not making any hostile movements and Kalawarner began cautiously once they'd touched down, "Naruto-san, we no longer wish to fight."

"What brought about this change of heart?" he absently wondered while inwardly dancing his victory dance.

"We're not idiots," the Lolita-wearing one sniffed derisively, only for a stern look from her partner to cow her attitude. "Look, we're done, alright? We don't really feel like dying tonight, and we're smart enough to know a fight we can't win. All we want to do is get Dohnaseek and get our asses back to the Grigori."

"We'll never darken your door again," the older woman promised him. "All we ask is that you let us go peacefully."

"And just why should I?" Naruto queried seemingly innocently, but the deliberate undercurrent of his unleashed Killing Intent caused the two Fallen Angels to both freeze and start sweating nervously. His voice never heightened or lowered in volume, but somehow that seemed to terrify the two winged women even further. "Your leader killed my friend, and that idiot I put into that crater over there – who _is_ one of your friends – nearly killed me, and I would've died had Rias-chan here not saved me. So, tell me why I shouldn't just kill you where you stand and forever be done with the whole lot of you _Fallen Angels_."

The two ladies shared a brief glance before they both turned back towards him with uncertainty all over their faces. Mittelt gulped audibly and offered to him, "If…If you let us go, we'll-we'll tell you all about the ceremony Raynare-sama is using to extract that nun's Sacred Gear. We'll even tell you how to reverse it!"

Naruto held out a hand to keep Rias from speaking right then and ending this discussion where it stood, making her puff her cheeks out in annoyance while Akeno merely giggled at the reaction. "Would you swear, to _me_, on your meaningless lives that you'll tell me the truth – no hiding _anything_?" he practically demanded with a look that would've frozen the most devastating active volcano over permanently.

"We-We would," the violet-haired one agreed hurriedly and the both of them gave him fast, terrified nods of their heads. "We swear that what we can tell you is completely, one-hundred percent accurate information."

"Well, go on then," the heir to the Yondaime Hokage prompted their explanations while he crossed his arms over his chest with his face completely unreadable. "I'm waiting."

The two women shared one last look before both turned towards him and began to spill everything that they knew. For a full, solid two minutes the pair of Fallen Angel women expounded upon everything about Raynare's plot to steal Asia's rare Sacred Gear in an attempt to gain their leader's favor through using a certain ritual accompanied by technology developed by the Grigori's Research Institute. Mittelt had also gone into detail about all the circumstances surrounding Issei's 'death' and explained to him how they'd been charged to follow Raynare's orders and that she'd decided to end the boy's life in order to prevent him from becoming an enemy to the Fallen Angels, though that one had backfired considerably. The two women then explained the ritual and how to reverse it – which Akeno had already professed to knowing all about earlier – and using Akeno's already-provided information combined with Kurama's ability to innately know whenever someone uses deceit he was able to ascertain that the two of them were completely honest with him.

"There," Kalawarner finished. "That's everything you wanted to know."

"Can we go now?" Mittelt nearly pleaded with him. "We honestly don't know any more than that."

The jinchuuriki stared down at the pair with his face betraying absolutely none of his thoughts in the slightest to the outside world. The two Fallen Angels fidgeted nervously beneath his cold stare like two convicts awaiting their fates to be decided for them. "Go," he eventually instructed them evenly.

The duo of winged women let out audible sighs in relief after hearing his single-word decision. Each of them then thanked him for his decision before they sprouted their feathery wings, flew over and collected their unconscious and drooling friend from his crater, and finally managed to depart the area once Akeno dispelled the barrier under a reluctant Rias' orders.

"Ara, ara. You're quite merciful to your enemies, Naruto-kun," Akeno pointed out with a small grin.

"Like I said, I don't care at all about the war between the Three Great Powers," the blonde shrugged his shoulders in response. "There wasn't a need to cause any more violence, so I didn't. To me, excessive acts so long as there's an alternative are the _worst_ crimes anyone can commit. Everyone deserves a second chance, Akeno, no matter who they are. It isn't my place to judge a person."

"Ara, ara," the Japanese woman grinned while she released a few of her pleased giggles.

Rias narrowed her azure eyes on the lone male present and she informed him, "Second chances can lead to your enemies coming back even stronger than before, Naruto-kun."

"I know that," he shot back with a slight bite to his words. "And should they, then I'll finish the job. Do _not_ mistake mercy for weakness, Rias-chan. I have killed much more than my fair share, but so long as a realistic alternative is possible I will _not_ kill. I would recommend you think about that for a while, because becoming numb to _murder_ is _the_ most horrifying quality a person can have. I _refuse_ to ever become like that, and I hope no one I know ever does as well."

The crimson-haired girl maintained their direct eye contact for a tension-filled moment until an explosion of power coming in the direction of the Fallen Angel church tore their attention and gazes in that direction. "Issei," the two of them both breathed in realization with Naruto's eyes brimming with pride.

"We can continue our philosophical debate some other time," the former Kage-in-training reminded his master. "For now, it's time for the final stage."

Rias returned with a terse nod before voicing agreement, "Then let's move."

All three Devils then sprouted their sets of bat-like wings and each took off simultaneously towards the way the power surge came from. The flight only took the trio about thirty seconds in total, but the silence was so thick between Naruto and Rias that it could've been cut with a knife, which only seemed to amuse Akeno all the more.

As soon as the tree-line disappeared and revealed the church in full visibility underneath the pale moonlight, all three Devils watched someone crash through the stained glass window on the building's steeple and crash down onto the ground, unmoving. Naruto's lips twitched up as he thought, _Great job, Issei. You're already getting stronger and you don't even realize it._

"Naruto," the red-haired King ordered quietly as they approached the church through the air.

"Already on it," he waved her off lazily. "She'll be brought in when I simply give the thought."

"Good," she nodded simply and then they all flew into the now-open window and silently landed next to a bawling Issei who was crying over Asia's still body.

A sad frown appeared over the jinchuuriki's whiskered cheeks as he merely stood there and mercilessly crushed the small feeling of impotence trying to make itself known to him again. _I'm sorry, Issei_ he wanted desperately to apologize, but he knew that nothing could console the boy aside from a single thing now.

"Buchou," Kiba greeted them with a bow that showed off a new collection of shallow cuts along his entire Kuoh uniform, but no blood at all, which greatly impressed Naruto. "All has been handled."

"…Priests dealt with," Koneko confirmed with her own nod.

"Good work, the both of you," their master congratulated with a pleased nod and smile. Her face then turned somber while she approached Issei and placed a hand on his shivering shoulder consolingly. "Issei…"

"I'm so sorry, Buchou," the distraught teen apologized with tears of both grief and regret mercilessly falling from his eyes. "I couldn't save her. Even after using Promotion, I still wasn't fast enough!"

"No one will blame you," she assured him gently. "All you lacked was experience as a Devil."

_Not the best choice of words,_ the whiskered blonde thought with a small grimace. _That's not going to help him. You know what he needs right now, Rias, and we both know you'll be giving it to him._

"It's not fair," Issei sobbed out into the still air of the abandoned church. "Asia didn't deserve to die like I did. I'm a pervert, people call me scum and sometimes rightfully so, but Asia? She was so nice, kind, and compassionate. She had the most beautiful smile, the biggest heart, and she always wanted nothing but to help other people feel better, even after it got her branded a Witch by the only family she'd ever known. If there was ever anyone in the whole world that deserved to live _it was her!_ How can there be a God that would allow something like this to happen?" he mumbled as he finished.

"Yo, Boss!" Naruto's clone called out to them all after the church's doors were slammed open. They all then turned and observed the identical Bunshin dragging Raynare inside the church and towards the group of six Devils by the top of her hair. "You ordered one smokin' hot Fallen Angel," he presented flippantly before throwing the woman in front of them while she screamed in pain once she landed.

"Good job," the original thanked the chakra-copy.

"The best," the lone Shadow Clone promised him with a conspiratorial wink. "She's all ready to be judged, Boss," he whispered and then disappeared in a puff of smoke.

_Excellent,_ the shinobi thought with a smirk hidden behind his spiky blonde bangs once the clone's memories of the past few minutes came to him. The teen's cerulean eyes then locked with the Fallen Angel's violet pair and stayed that way until she bowed her head resignedly to him.

"Am I the only one still not used to the idea of Naruto-kun being able to create copies of himself at will?" Kiba whispered too low for anyone not using enhanced hearing to notice. Naruto saw Koneko shake her head in the negative out of the corner of his eye and the swordsman let out a relieved breath. "I thought I was the only one."

"Good evening, Fallen Angel-san," Rias greeted her with a formal politeness.

"My name is Raynare, Gremory," the dark-haired young woman interrupted the ceremonial false-niceties. "If you're going to try and rend judgment on me, then at the very least you should use my name."

"Very well, Raynare-san," the Devil-woman accepted politely. "I'll start by telling you about how your co-conspirators have abandoned you and your little schemes."

"…I already know," the Fallen Angel woman informed them all with a small glance sent Naruto's way. "That…_thing_ told me all about how hopeless my situation is now."

"It was a Bunshin, or clone, Raynare-san," the user of the Kage Bunshin technique interjected. "A solid, corporeal, free-thinking copy of myself."

"If that is true then Azazel-sama will want to get his hands on you dearly," she responded too low for anyone aside from him to overhear.

"Yes, Naruto-kun, but that's not why we're here now, are we?" the Devil King in the room reminded him with a small hint of annoyance bleeding into her tone.

"You're right, of course, Rias-chan," he conceded and backed up slowly. Raynare's eyes looked his way once more, but he simply avoided her gaze and looked towards Rias.

"I suppose that telling you now won't cause any harm," the azure-eyed beauty mused aloud. "Tell me, do you know just what Sacred Gear that is?" she asked while she pointed at Issei's now-hand-covering gauntlet.

"Our intelligence suggested that it was a Twice Critical," Raynare admitted to them. "It held a Dragon's aura and our experts ruled that it was the most likely."

"Most likely, but still incorrect," Rias informed the defeated foe with a small, pleased smirk on her face. "You see, that gauntlet is so much more than a mere Twice Critical. The boy you stabbed two weeks ago and the one now standing here before you holds the Boosted Gear, one of the thirteen Longinus."

"No-No way!" the Fallen Angel female shrieked in denial. "There's no way a mere boy like _him_ holds the power to slay a God!"

"Believe it," the crimson-haired Devil confirmed with a simple inclination of her head. "Issei wields one of the most powerful Sacred Gears in the world, and you killed him thinking it was one of the simplest."

"So this thing has _that_ kind of power, huh?" the boy with the Longinus murmured in awe while running his uncovered palm down the red gauntlet's entire spiked length. He then let out a few mirthless chuckles and wondered out loud, "Maybe I could've even saved Asia if I'd known that."

_No, Issei, you're mistaken on that,_ Naruto wanted to tell him, but couldn't interrupt the current act for anything. _That is your _potential_,__ not your current abilities. I suppose I'll need to drive that fact home soon. I don't want you making the same mistakes I nearly did._

"Who would've thought," Raynare mumbled resignedly while laughing humorlessly, "that _the_ Boosted Gear would reside in such an idiot and pervert?"

"Very well then," Rias strode towards the frozen woman kneeling on the church floor with a fierce look within her eyes. "For the crimes of harming one of my servant's friends as well as harming my precious servant himself earlier today, I sentence you to death, Raynare-san." The Power of Destruction formed in one of her held out hands and she offered, "Any last words?"

Reynare's violet eyes darted towards Naruto's briefly before she stared directly into the furious golden irises of the boy she'd so severely scarred – both physically and mentally. Her eyes then softened in regret as one of her hands covered her other wrist, which surprised Issei greatly, and she shook her head to Rias' offer. "I have nothing left to say," Raynare admitted resignedly.

"Then I, Rias Gremory –"

"Stop it, Rias-chan," Naruto's calm voice sliced through the tension like a diamond-sharp blade. "Quit this before you can't turn back."

Pure rage overtook the Devil's azure eyes at the interruption and she whirled around to glare at the defiant jinchuuriki. "Do _not_ seek to lecture _me,_ Naruto. _I_ am the master, and _you_ the servant. It is _my_ decision on whether she lives or not, and _I_ have chosen that she dies."

"How many times must I repeat it before it gets through your thick skull? I. Don't. Care. About. That," he shot back with his own voice beginning to rise. He stared directly into the wide, surprised eyes of Raynare and reiterated, "_I_ don't and have never cared about the supposed war, Rias-chan." He then moved in front of the kneeling woman and stood between her and Rias protectively.

"This isn't about the war, Naruto," the King told him through gritted teeth. "This is about what she has done to Issei!"

"Naruto, what are you _doing_!?" Issei shouted at him in disbelief at his actions. "Have you gone completely _insane_!? Do you even know what that _Fallen Angel_ has done!?"

"I am well aware of all Raynare has done, Issei," he growled back in a reminder. He then returned Rias' glare with just as much heat as hers and he pointed out, "And isn't it, Rias-chan? If this was _just_ about Issei, then you'd have had no issues at all with me letting those other three go alive and in peace."

The leader of the Occult Research Club grimaced slightly at hearing his truthful words, but she refused to relent, "Regardless of that, I can't allow her deeds to go unpunished, Naruto. She _killed_ Issei, your _friend_, and directly attacked him earlier today. I _cannot_ let that go."

"And she will be punished," the blue-eyed former apprentice of Jiraiya conceded, "but not by you. She's been going against her superior's orders this whole time. Let _them_ deal with her punishment."

Azure and cerulean continued to stare directly into each other while their wielders contested in a battle of wills. Eventually, Rias broke the apprehensive silence by stating, "_I_ am the leader, Naruto, and it is my job to see justice done."

"A leader incapable of mercy isn't one worth following," Naruto shot back evenly, making Rias recoil in shock. "Someone charged with another's life who can't even be bothered to spare one doesn't understand what it means to lead; all they are is a tyrant!"

Every member of the Gremory Group's eyes shot wide open at Naruto's choice of words. Every single one of them stared towards their master for her reaction, who looked like the shinobi had just physically struck her.

"Why are you protecting her, Naruto!?" Issei shrieked at him with fear and betrayal in his eyes. "She's the reason Asia's dead!"

"But she won't remain so for long," the boy's friend pointed out to him, stopping his protests cold.

Issei's golden eyes glossed over and he stammered out in shock, "You-You mean…" His gaze traveled over to their master and he asked with a hopeful desperation, "Buchou, will you?"

The King's gaze softened towards her Pawn and then she glared towards her Unique Piece with twice the intensity as before once she realized that he'd cornered her. "Not without her Sacred Gear I won't," she growled at him as she tried to regain control of the situation far too late, which slightly amused the former Kage apprentice. "Without Twilight Healing, that nun holds no value or potential worth as a Piece."

_And I win,_ Naruto realized with a mental smirk as he watched Issei's golden eyes reflect an even greater sense of hurt than even his friend defending his murderer caused. "Then if Asia's Sacred Gear can be safely returned to her you'll reincarnate her?" he presented an out, even though he already knew what the outcome would be.

"Yes," she agreed, though her jaw was clenched and her teeth gritted.

Naruto smirked at her briefly before he turned around and asked a stunned Raynare with a kindly smile, "Would you be so kind as to give Asia-chan back her Sacred Gear, Raynare-san?"

To the shock of everyone present aside from an expectant whiskered blonde, she nodded in assent to his request. "Yes," she agreed, although with a reluctance in her eyes. "If you will let me go safely, I'll return Twilight Healing to her peacefully."

"We don't –"

"Is your attitude really for Issei's 'good', Rias-chan?" Naruto quickly interrupted her protests before she could gain any momentum back. He whirled around with a determined stare and asked, "If so, then tell me what killing Raynare would do for him?"

"Closure!" Rias declared. "Her shadow wouldn't hang over him like it does now!"

"Closure?" he repeated skeptically. The shinobi chuckled ruefully at her response and informed them all, "You mean _revenge_, Rias-chan. Don't try and pass this off for something other than what everyone else here knows is true. Tell me, Issei, do _you_ think that Raynare here's death is _closure_, or _vengeance_? And don't try to lie to us, because I _know_ when a man is lying."

Every set of eyes then went over towards the visibly-nervous boy. Issei gulped and his eyes shone in confusion while he spent a few tense minutes in contemplation under everyone's curious gazes.

The boy eventually managed to find his voice again and told them all, "I think…it's a little of both actually, but right now I don't really care. All I want is for Asia to come back, and I'm starting to feel like too many people have died because of me. I probably won't ever stop hating you for what you did to me and Asia, Yuuma-chan, but I don't want to see another person die. So long as Asia gets her Sacred Gear back, you can fly back to your Fallen Angel's nest as far as I care."

"Well said, Issei," the boy's friend congratulated his insightful words with a respectful nod. "I guess you understand that revenge is _never _the answer, Issei. So you see, Rias-chan, all revenge leaves is a gaping hole in your heart."

"And how would _you_ know this?" Rias nearly demanded as she watched her last legitimate reason for justifiably killing the Fallen Angel abandon her.

A morose smile upon the youth's aged face stopped her cold and he answered softly, "I know the effects of vengeance on the heart better than anyone. I watched my best friend's descent into darkness because of his desire for revenge on the person who was blamed for killing his family. Like me, he understood what loneliness was, and we became each other's best friend…for a time. You see, he was too obsessed with his revenge and eventually his mind simply couldn't see past it. Revenge ate away at his sanity; it _drove_ him.

"And the really sad part: He got it." The teen's cerulean eyes glassed over and his eyes panned upwards as he continued, "He got his revenge, but it wasn't enough for him. Years of wanting nothing but his vengeance left him broken inside. Instead of closure, like we'd all hoped it would give him, all that was left was a shadow of his former self. It destroyed his sanity, and I eventually had no choice but to kill him after he'd murdered my fiancée and his former friend.

"So yes, Rias-chan," he finished for the completely stunned audience, "I know what revenge does to a person. It offers no closure or solace, it only leaves a void right here," he placed a hand over his heart as a single tear fell from his right eye and dripped off of his chin and echoed off the church's floor, "right where it used to be."

No one spoke. Hardly anyone breathed. Not a single person was even capable of movement after hearing his words. Issei was positively gobsmacked after hearing so much of his friend's mysterious past that he'd so studiously avoided mentioning. Kiba shook his head vigorously after a moment as if a thought he didn't want had just appeared in his mind. Koneko's face remained unchanged, but a flash of both regret and understanding went across her golden eyes. Akeno's eyebrows had both shot up so far that they were hiding beneath her spiky bangs and her face reflected complete and utter surprise. Raynare was staring at him like she couldn't understand if his monologue had been completely truthful or if it had been a very convincing story created on her part. And Rias, she was frozen stiff at hearing his revelations for a period of moments before her eyes went gentle in light of this new insight into what made Naruto into who he was today.

After what felt like two eternities of nothing but stunned silence inside the church, Rias eventually managed to say, "I…understand, Naruto-kun." She then turned to Issei and made sure, "Are you certain, Issei, that you don't want to make Raynare pay for what she's done to you?"

The brown-haired boy closed his eyes sadly and shook his head in response. "No, Buchou," he declined in finality. "Naruto's right. Let her go. Let her face the consequences of her actions from her superiors." The Pawn then spoke directly to the Fallen Angel, "Please just give Asia back her Sacred Gear, Yuuma-chan. If you even have an ounce of heart you'll let Asia live again. Let her finally have a family that won't turn her away like the Church did."

"I will," Raynare answered the boy's heartfelt plea. "If I may?" she then asked the crimson-haired King. Rias acquiesced with a small, terse nod and the violet-eyed young woman stood up from her knees and walked over to where Issei was standing over a peaceful-looking Asia.

The dark-haired killer of both Issei and the blonde girl lying on the church's pew then mumbled something too low to hear before both of her hands came to rest just above the center of her chest. A soft green glow emanated from her chest and as she pulled her hands away from her bosom a pair of ornate silver rings melted out of her body and slowly floated into her open palms.

"Here," Raynare spoke only to Issei. She held out the two rings and placed them in Issei's hand before turning and asking the group's master, "Will you let me leave now? I've done as you asked."

Rias answered, "You may. But do not ever seek to encroach here in my territory again," she then warned dangerously. "Regardless of _anyone's_ words," she glared towards the unrepentant Unique Piece while she finished, "you _will_ die, Raynare-san."

"I don't doubt it," the dark-haired Fallen Angel replied steadily. She then turned away from Rias and walked towards her blonde savior. Once she got close she expressed her gratitude, "Thank you, Devil-kun, for intervening on my behalf, even though it no doubt has gotten you into quite a bit of trouble with your master."

"It's Naruto," he told her. The jinchuuriki waved off her pseudo-concern and assured her off-handedly, "Besides, I ain't afraid to piss off the people in charge. So long as another way exists, I'll find it." He let out a few mirthful chuckles as Kurama said something in his head and he verbally agreed, "I suppose I still am the 'Number One most surprising and Knuckleheaded Ninja.'"

"Can you also thank your clone for me?" Raynare requested in a conspiratorial whisper so as to not be overheard. "It all went exactly like he said, and had it not been for his instructions, I'd be dead without a doubt. He was right in that playing on Issei's pity would've been my death sentence."

"Oh, that was all me," the user of the Kage Bunshin technique revealed to her, making her blink in confusion. "Everything my Kage Bunshin told you I instructed it to. I was actually more amazed when I got its memories that it managed to convince you to play along."

"You are apparently a very…_persuasive_ person, Naruto-kun," the woman told him. She then smiled gratefully and added, "You know, I've never before met a Devil quite like you: Someone who spares your lifelong enemy's life."

"I believe in second chances, Raynare-chan," Naruto shrugged nonchalantly. His cerulean eyes peered over her shoulder and he instructed, "I believe it's time for you to go. Rias-chan is just now bringing Asia-chan back from the grave."

Her violet gaze joined his and she agreed, "I should leave then." She then turned back to him and repeated, "Thank you, Naruto-kun, again, for helping to spare my life. I hope we never meet again on the battlefield, as it would seem ungrateful of me to kill my savior."

"Trust me, you wouldn't stand a chance," the shinobi promised her in an icy tone. "_Don't_ waste this opportunity, Raynare-chan. Take your lumps and become the better person from it. Because if you don't, it will be the last mistake you'll ever make, and Rias-chan won't even get her chance," he finished in a menacing hiss.

A visible shiver went down the Fallen Angel's shoulders as she stared directly into his frosty-blue eyes. "I'll try to remember your advice," she offered before sprouting her feathery black wings and she flew out of the church.

"I truly hope you do, Raynare-chan," Naruto murmured under his breath as he watched a teary-eyed Issei crush a confused Asia in a tight embrace once the ceremony had been completed. His gaze panned over to see a wistfully smiling Rias observing the emotional reunion with a soft smile while he thought out loud, "Otherwise the coming shit-storm will have truly been all for nothing."

* * *

**A/N: **Happy Fourth of July everyone! Today is a day for all of us Yanks to celebrate the day we declared our independence from those pestering Red Coats! May the mirthful cries and the loud bangs of fireworks run loud and long!

Now, seeing as how I have to work all day, I'm letting you all have this a little early. I spoil you all far too much.

To everyone who doesn't care, I wish you all a happy Friday and I hope whoever you're rooting for wins the World Cup. All of the heart-wrenching agony of watching Tim Howard's performance on Monday has withered away for me (We would've frickin' won had Wondo just put it in the fucking net in the third stoppage time minute! I don't care if we didn't deserve it!). I thought after that magnificent effort, "Tim Howard must have a huge red S underneath that uniform." ...Although he shouldn't have had to make that many saves in the first place! For now, I root for the Flying Dutchmen (get it?). Personally, I think that the finals will be the Dutch vs either Brazil or Colombia (I hope Colombia, because I'm just not able to root for the home country winning the World Cup). I just can't see anyone in the latter half of the bracket beating the Dutch as it stands right now, and I think that momentum will carry on into the Final to bring them the Cup against either team.

Here's the finale of the first arc everyone. I hope you liked it. I'm not going to bother explaining anything anymore, as it goes against every fiber of my writing being. As a writer, all I am obliged to do is present the story to you. It is up to the readers to determine the importance or determine my reasoning. And now I will never tell anyone anything ever again! Mwahahahaha!

Enjoy it, you pathetic mortals!


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